Orchard Towers murder: Man gets jail, caning after pleading guilty to reduced charge

SINGAPORE - A man originally accused of murder following a 2019 brawl at Orchard Towers was sentenced on Friday (March 5) to four years and nine months' jail with 12 strokes of the cane after pleading guilty to a reduced charge of being in the company of someone who had a weapon in his possession.

Tan Hong Sheng, now 24, was the sixth person linked to the case who was dealt with in a district court.

On Feb 5, he pleaded guilty to being in the company of Tan Sen Yang, now 29, who had a kerambit knife at Orchard Towers on the day Mr Satheesh Noel Gobidass, 31, was killed.

The younger man also admitted last month to two unrelated rioting charges.

Tan Hong Sheng was one of seven people initially charged with Mr Satheesh's murder on July 2, 2019.

Tan Sen Yang still faces a murder charge and will be dealt with in the High Court. The other six have had their murder charges reduced to less serious ones such as assault.

Tan Hong Sheng's lawyers, Mr Josephus Tan and Mr Cory Wong from Invictus Law Corporation, had earlier said that their client did not participate in the attack on Mr Satheesh and instead tried to stop it.

The court heard that Tan Hong Sheng and his group were at the Naughty Girl Club on the second storey of Orchard Towers when a dispute broke out at the entrance.

He was walking out of the mall in the early hours of that day when Mr Satheesh confronted a member of his group.

Deputy Public Prosecutors Ang Feng Qian, Dora Tay and Benedict Teong had stated in court documents: "During this time, the accused had noticed that (Tan Sen Yang) had the kerambit knife in his right hand when he went towards Satheesh and started punching him with the said knife in his right hand.

"During this assault, (Tan Sen Yang) injured Satheesh fatally when he used the kerambit knife to inflict multiple injures to Satheesh's head and neck area."

Mr Satheesh collapsed and was pronounced dead at Tan Tock Seng Hospital at around 7.30am.

Tan Hong Sheng had committed earlier acts of rioting and was on bail for one of them when he went to Orchard Towers on the day of the fatal attack.

Citing the earlier case on Nov 18, 2018, the DPPs stated that he was at Club V5 Thai disco at Ming Arcade in Cuscaden Road when a fight broke out between his friends and another group.

Tan Hong Sheng picked up a liquor bottle and used it to repeatedly strike a man's head before fleeing to Johor Baru.

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He later returned to Singapore and police arrested him on Feb 25, 2019. He was then released pending further investigations.

Despite this, he reoffended about two months later and committed a second act of rioting, this time outside another nightspot called District 9 in Orchard Road.

During the scuffle, he used a pair of ice tongs to repeatedly hit a man's face. Tan Hong Sheng and his group were arrested, and he was later released on bail.

Four of the offenders linked to the Orchard Towers incident had been convicted and sentenced to jail earlier.

They are: Natalie Siow Yu Zhen, 24, Joel Tan Yun Sheng, Ang Da Yuan and Loo Boon Chong. All three men are 27 years old.

A fifth member of the group, Mr Chan Jia Xing, also 27, was given a conditional warning for consorting with a person carrying an offensive weapon in a public place.

This article was first published in The Straits Times. Permission required for reproduction.