Public Prosecutor v Aguilar Guen Garlejo

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: V K Rajah J
• Judgment Date: 29 May 2006
• Neutral Citation: [2006] SGHC 94
• Docket Number: Criminal Case No 15 of 2006
• Date: 29 May 2006
• Year: 2006
• Published date: 01 June 2006
• Plaintiff Counsel: Cheng Howe Ming and Jill Tan (Deputy Public Prosecutors)
• Citation: [2006] SGHC 94
• Defendant Counsel: Nathan Shashidran, Navin Joseph Lobo and Poh Ju Lyn Evangeline (Harry Elias Partnership), and Nandwani Manoj Prakash (Gabriel Law Corporation)
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Subject Matter: Sentencing,Mitigation,Mentally disordered offenders,Accused appearing to have recovered from depression and having low risk of recidivism,Accused co-operating with investigation and not attempting to flee,Accused having no criminal antecedents,Accused suffering from depression amounting to abnormality of mind at time of offence,Accused pleading guilty to charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder,Criminal Procedure and Sentencing,Appropriate sentence to be imposed,Accused's commission of offence not premeditated

29 May 2006

V K Rajah J:

1 On 9 September 2005 at about 12.45pm, a street cleaner made a grotesque discovery next to the Orchard Road Mass Rapid Transit (“MRT”) station. He found a severed human head in a bag. This was to set in motion a series of revelations that captured the nation’s attention for the next few days. The press and the public alike were consumed by a sense of revulsion as it appeared that an appalling crime had been committed. Why would anyone in his or her right frame of mind commit such an abominable act?

The factual matrix

2 The police arrived at the scene at about 1.53pm and promptly cordoned off the place. The bag was examined and found to contain pages from The Straits Times dated 8 September 2005 and two black garbage bags. Inside the garbage bags were more red plastic bags containing a pair of severed arms and legs. The torso was missing. A right thumbprint from one of the hands was obtained and upon screening was ascertained to be that of Jane Parangan La Puebla (“the deceased”).

3 A check with the deceased’s employer revealed that a missing person’s report had been made on 8 September 2005. The report asserted that she had been missing since 7 September 2005.

4 Later on 9 September 2005 at around 6.10pm, the police received a call about an unattended “World Polo” suitcase swarming with flies that had been found at MacRitchie Reservoir. The suitcase was lying on a grass verge near the footpath at the reservoir just metres away from Lornie Road. The police unzipped the bag and found a torso crudely wrapped up in some garbage bags. The head and limbs were missing. The torso had feminine attributes and was only clad in a brown bra and panties. The bag contained pages from the 6, 7 and 8 September issues of The Straits Times. There was also a copy of the International Herald Tribune on which was affixed the label: “Mr Prakash Mallya #08-23 Sunglade 9 Serangoon Ave 2”.

5 Police officers immediately proceeded to the apartment whose address was on the label (“the Sunglade apartment”) that was occupied by Mr Prakash Mallya and his wife, Anjali Mallya. Guen Garlejo Aguilar (“the accused”), their domestic assistant, was also present in the Sunglade apartment. The police interviewed the accused. She admitted knowing the deceased but denied any knowledge of her whereabouts.

6 A search of the accused’s room was also conducted in the presence of her employers. There were blood stains on the underside of her mattress and on the floor below her bed. Inside a rubbish bin just outside the accused’s room, police found sheared pieces of the deceased’s work permit and a “World Polo” card tag that came from the suitcase found at MacRitchie Reservoir. Inside a kitchen cabinet under the kitchen sink, the officers also found an opened packet of red plastic bags, a chopper and an axe. The Mallyas confirmed that the chopper and the axe did not belong to them. Nor had they seen those items previously.

7 In the wee hours of the morning of 10 September 2005 at about 12.40am, the accused was placed under arrest for the murder of the deceased.

8 The accused’s first statement was recorded on the same day. In it, she denied any knowledge of Jane’s death. According to her, the deceased was still alive when she left the Sunglade apartment. However, in a second statement recorded on 13 September 2005, the accused admitted having had a fight with the deceased that culminated in her demise.

The fight and the dismemberment

9 Investigations revealed that the accused and the deceased met sometime in March of 2005 at Orchard Road. They soon became firm friends and met each other regularly. By all accounts they had a close friendship until just before the incident.

10 At 12.35pm on 7 September 2005, the deceased visited the accused at the Sunglade apartment where a bitter argument ensued between them. This soon escalated into an exchange of blows.

11 The fight started in the accused’s room and subsequently spilled into the laundry area. As a result of the fight, both the women were injured. In the midst of their struggle, the accused grabbed the deceased’s neck tightly with her right hand. The agreed statement of facts describes the ensuing struggle thus:

She then took a cushion with her left hand and smothered the deceased’s face. After sensing that the deceased was not moving, the accused removed the cushion. At this point the deceased began to move both her hands. The accused then used both her hands and strangled the deceased until the deceased stopped breathing.

12 The accused then placed the body inside a large “Santa Barbara Polo & Racquet Club” luggage bag to conceal it. She later attempted to remove all traces of the deceased’s presence in the Sunglade apartment by cleaning up the bloodstains. She also removed the deceased’s personal effects and her work permit from the body.

13 The accused claims that she was in a daze after the incident. She was unable to recall precisely what transpired over the next two days. Two days later, on the morning of 9 September 2005, the accused took a train to Farrer Park MRT station after which she proceeded to the Mohamed Mustafa Shopping Centre. There, she purchased a chopper, an axe, a pair of canvas gloves, a pair of latex gloves, green wallpaper, a bottle of Breeze detergent, a bolster, two pillowcases, a bed sheet and a packet of black garbage bags.

14 The accused then headed back to the Sunglade apartment where she systematically dismembered the deceased’s body and placed the body parts into a bag and a suitcase. The accused asserts all this was done while she was in a state of bewilderment. Her mind was still numb and whirling with shock that she had killed her best friend.

15 With the use of the recently purchased cleaning equipment, she cleaned up the flat taking pains to ensure that no traces of blood were left. She then used the green wallpaper to cover up parts of the walls just above her bed. The accused also turned over the mattress and covered it with the new bed sheet. She later changed the pillowcase and threw away the blanket that was on the bed, washed and cleaned the chopper and axe, and placed them in the kitchen cabinet underneath the kitchen sink. Finally, she threw away the gloves and the cushion used to smother the deceased.

16 On the following day, she took a taxi to Orchard Road and placed the bag containing the deceased’s head near the Orchard Road MRT station. Later she proceeded to MacRitchie Reservoir where she placed the suitcase near a public footpath within clear view, making no effort to conceal it. The accused cannot explain why she did this.

The accused’s injuries

17 The following injuries were noted on the accused when she was examined on 10 September 2005 at 10.33am by Dr Ian Jay Basiao Tan of Alexandra Hospital:

(a) abrasions on the right shoulder, left leg, and nape; and

(b) haematomas on the right forearm, left lower leg, left back and right forearm.

Dr Wee Keng Poh’s autopsy report

18 Dr Wee Keng Poh (“Dr Wee”) performed an autopsy on the deceased. Other than the marks sustained as a result of the dismemberment, the following ante-mortem injuries were noted:

(a) Head and neck – two large bruises, a haematoma with bruise, a laceration with surrounding bruise;

(b) Left upper limb – a large bruise over the elbow;

(c) Left lower limb – several bruises of varying sizes over the ankle, shin, knee and thigh;

(d) Right upper limb – three superficial cuts extending as superficial linear abrasions roughly parallel to each other, a human bite mark with impressions of seven teeth over the mid-forearm;

(e) Right lower limb – several bruises over the ankle, knee and shin, a cut on the knee and on the back of the heel, abrasions on the forefoot and leg.

19 Dr Wee filed a report on the cause of death on 6 December 2005. Based on the DNA profiling of all the body parts and the fact that the skin tone was the same, he concluded that all the body parts belonged to the deceased.

20 Dr Wee stated that a toxicological analysis of the blood and urine samples did not reveal any poisons. Due to the multitude of superficial ante-mortem external injuries, he concluded that there was a struggle prior to her death. He declined to exclude the possibility of the deceased having been smothered. Nor did he rule out that death could have resulted from the altercation or from dismemberment.

21 Dr Wee confirmed in the course of the hearing that the deceased sustained substantially more injuries over a greater area of her body as compared with the accused.

Mitigation

22 The accused, who is now 30 years old, is a citizen of the Philippines who lives in the municipality of Tagudin, Ilocos Sur. In late 2001, she left her husband and two sons to seek employment in Singapore in order to supplement the family’s meagre income.

23 The accused and the deceased became close friends soon after they met. The accused confided in the deceased that she was in the throes of domestic strife. She sorely missed her children. The relationship with her husband, Edwin, was also on the rocks.

24 The deceased had in the context of their close kinship solicited money from the accused claiming that she urgently needed to remit the money back home. The accused repeatedly obliged. Over time, the deceased borrowed a total of $2,000 from or through the accused. Half of this came from the accused’s own savings. The remainder was procured through another Filipino friend, Jenny Narag (“Jenny”). Jenny had in turn borrowed the money on the accused’s behalf from a loan shark. The accused had to pay monthly interest at the rate of 20% on this loan. The accused became increasingly agitated about the overdue loan and began to feel intense pressure over the urgency and overwhelming need to settle the outstanding amount. The deceased, on the other hand, adopted an entirely cavalier attitude about settling her financial obligation. In the context of her own prevailing family...