Public Prosecutor v Wang Zhijian and another appeal

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Chao Hick Tin JA
• Judgment Date: 28 November 2014
• Neutral Citation: [2014] SGCA 58
• Court: Court of Appeal (Singapore)
• Docket Number: Criminal Appeals Nos 12 of 2012 and 4 of 2013
• Published date: 02 December 2014
• Year: 2014
• Hearing Date: 30 September 2014
• Defendant Counsel: Kelvin Lim (Kelvin Lim & Partners) and Jason Dendroff (J P Dendroff & Co),Mohamed Faizal, Hay Hung Chun and Timotheus Koh (Attorney-General's Chambers)
• Subject Matter: Criminal Law,Murder,Special exceptions,Diminished responsibility
• Citation: [2014] SGCA 58

Chao Hick Tin JA (delivering the judgment of the court):

This was a tragic case involving the deaths of two women and a teenaged girl, with a second teenaged girl being seriously injured, in a single night of violence in the confines of a rented flat. Providing the backdrop to these events was the passionate, tortured and at times bizarre relationship between the man accused of the crimes and one of the deceased women.

The accused person is one Wang Zhijian (“the Accused”), a 48-year-old male Chinese national who was 42 years old at the time of the events. The four victims were all female Chinese nationals residing in the same flat. The first deceased is Zhang Meng (“Zhang”), who was in a romantic and sexual relationship with the Accused prior to her death. She was 42 years old at the time of her death. The second deceased is Feng Jianyu (“Feng”), the daughter of Zhang and 17 years old at the time of her death. The third deceased is Yang Jie (“Yang”), aged 36 at the time of her death. The sole surviving victim of the attacks is Li Meilin (“Li”), the daughter of Yang. She is now 21 years old and was 15 years old at the time of the events. The Accused faced the following four charges:

That you, WANG ZHIJIAN,

1st CHARGE

Sometime between 11.00pm on the 18th day of September 2008 and 12.49 am on the 19th day of September 2008, at Block [XX] Yishun Avenue 11 #[YY]-[ZZ], Singapore, did commit murder by causing the death of one ZHANG MENG (Female/Date of Birth: 13 November 1966), and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under section 302 of the Penal Code, Chapter 224.

2nd CHARGE

Sometime between 11.00pm on the 18th day of September 2008 and 12.49 am on the 19th day of September 2008, at Block [XX] Yishun Avenue 11 #[YY]-[ZZ], Singapore, did commit murder by causing the death of one FENG JIANYU (Female/Date of Birth: 23 August 1991), and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under section 302 of the Penal Code, Chapter 224.

3rd CHARGE

Sometime between 11.00pm on the 18th day of September 2008 and 12.49 am on the 19th day of September 2008, at Block [XX] Yishun Avenue 11 #[YY]-[ZZ], Singapore, did attempt to murder one LI MEILIN (Female/Date of Birth: 10 February 1993), to wit, by slashing and stabbing her repeatedly with knives at various parts of her body including on her neck, lower back and face, with the intention of causing death to the said Li Meilin, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under section 307(1) of the Penal Code, Chapter 224.

4th CHARGE

Sometime between 11.00pm on the 18th day of September 2008 and 12.49 am on the 19th day of September 2008, at Block [XX] Yishun Avenue 11 #[YY]-[ZZ], Singapore, did commit murder by causing the death of one YANG JIE (Female/Date of Birth: 3 April 1972), and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under section 302 of the Penal Code, Chapter 224.

For convenience we will call these the 1st to 4th Charges respectively. The Prosecution stood down the 3rd Charge for attempted murder and proceeded with the 1st, 2nd and 4th Charges for murder. Although it was not so specified in each of these murder charges, the Prosecution subsequently clarified that it was proceeding under s 300(a) of the Penal Code (Cap 224, 2008 Rev Ed) (“the Penal Code”), which reads:

Murder 300. Except in the cases hereinafter excepted culpable homicide is murder —

(a) if the act by which the death is caused is done with the intention of causing death;

…

[emphasis added]

The Accused admitted that he had caused the deaths of Zhang and Feng. However, he did not admit that he had caused the death of Yang. For all three murder charges, the Accused relied on the defence of diminished responsibility found in Exception 7 to s 300 of the Penal Code, which states:

Exception 7.—Culpable homicide is not murder if the offender was suffering from such abnormality of mind (whether arising from a condition of arrested or retarded development of mind or any inherent causes or induced by disease or injury) as substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his acts and omissions in causing the death or being a party to causing the death.

In relation to this defence, the psychiatric experts of both the Prosecution and the Defence agreed that the Accused was suffering from a psychiatric condition known as “adjustment disorder”. However, the experts disagreed on whether the Accused’s psychiatric condition had substantially impaired his mental responsibility at the time he committed the offences.

Following a 10-day hearing, the trial judge (“the Judge”) delivered his judgment on 30 November 2012, reported as Public Prosecutor v Wang Zhijian [2012] SGHC 238 (“the Judgment”). He found the Accused guilty of murder under s 300(a) of the Penal Code in relation to the 4th Charge and sentenced him to suffer death. However, in relation to the 1st and 2nd Charges, the Judge found the Accused had succeeded in raising the defence of diminished responsibility. Hence the Accused was convicted of the lesser offences of culpable homicide not amounting to murder in relation to the 1st and 2nd Charges. The Judge reserved passing sentence on the 1st and 2nd Charges pending the outcome of any appeal that might be lodged by either or both the Prosecution and the Accused against his decision. In the event, cross appeals were lodged: Criminal Appeal No 12 of 2012 (“CCA 12/2012”) is the Prosecution’s appeal against the acquittal of the Accused on the 1st and 2nd Charges of the murder offences, and Criminal Appeal No 4 of 2013 (“CCA 4/2013”) is the Accused’s appeal against the conviction and sentence imposed in respect of the 4th Charge.

Background facts Relationship between the Accused and Zhang

The background facts to these appeals are set out in the Judgment. In brief, the Accused first met Zhang in China in 2005, and they soon began a romantic relationship. In 2007, Zhang’s daughter Feng came to Singapore to study, and she was accompanied by Zhang. They rented two bedrooms in a three-bedroom flat at Yishun Avenue 11 (“the Flat”). Zhang and Feng stayed in the master bedroom (“Bedroom 3”) of the Flat, which had an attached bathroom. The other bedroom (Bedroom 1) was used from time to time by Zhang’s friends and relatives. It was occupied by the Accused when he made his three trips to Singapore (see [9] below) to visit Zhang between July and September 2008. Yang and her daughter Li were the tenants of the remaining bedroom in the Flat (“Bedroom 2”) and were unrelated to the Accused and Zhang.

As stated, the Accused and Zhang began a relationship in China and the Accused’s undisputed evidence was that this relationship was not a smooth one as she was then married. When Zhang’s family found out about her association with the Accused, they objected to it. Some of Zhang’s family members even went to the Accused’s home and workplace to harass him. The Accused also recounted an incident where he was confronted by Zhang’s family members and received death threats from her brother. To avoid such harassments, the Accused had to change his place of residence frequently. He was also unable to continue working as a result. He chose to retire early and received over RMB$300,000 (about S$60,000) as retirement funds.

The Accused maintained that he continued to love Zhang despite her family members’ objections and her “extreme” character. Unsurprisingly, their relationship was tumultuous. According to the Accused, Zhang attempted suicide on two different occasions when he tried to break up with her. The intensity of their relationship is evidenced by the following extract from the Accused’s statement (“the Long Statement”) recorded by the police pursuant to s 121 of the Criminal Procedure Code (Cap 68, 1985 Rev Ed) (“the CPC”) on 24 September 2008:

15. … She also offered to write a letter in blood to reaffirm her love for me. She asked me to reaffirm my love for her and I did. She used a needle to prick one of her right fingers. She wrote Chinese characters in blood stating ‘我爱王志’ on a piece of A4 paper. She stopped writing the blood letter as she complained of pain. She then asked me to prick my finger which I did and I wrote the remaining ‘健我要嫁给他’ in blood on the same piece of paper. I kept that piece of blood paper. After that she asked me to show my love for her. I continued to write the ‘blood love letter’ to the effect ‘I love her until I died’ in Chinese characters. …

The Accused’s explanation of the tattoos on his body in his Long Statement recorded on 2 October 2008 also provides a glimpse into their tortured relationship:

Sometime in the beginning of May 2007, I had my first tattoo at my back. I tattooed Zhang Meng’s face and half-body on my back and a rose at the bottom. I did it to express my sincere love for Zhang Meng. I tattooed a snake on my left shoulder while a skeleton and heart on my right shoulder. The snake symbolize the viciousness of Zhang Meng. The skeleton resembled the ‘dead god’ slowly and gradually swallow[ing] my heart, and the ‘dead god’ referred to Zhang Meng. I had the two tattoos on my shoulders simultaneously in January this year. …

The Accused stated that Zhang was difficult to maintain because she liked a lavish lifestyle. With Zhang’s expenditure and his own losses in the stock market, his retirement funds were soon reduced to RMB$50,000.

In November 2007, Zhang’s daughter, Feng, secured a place in a secondary school in Singapore. Zhang decided to accompany her to Singapore. She suggested that the Accused come to Singapore to be with her, and promised to help him find work. Before Zhang’s death, the Accused visited Singapore three times. The Accused’s third visit to Singapore was on 9 September 2008. During this visit, he stayed in Bedroom 1 until the fateful events nine days later on 18 September 2008.

Zhang’s humiliating and abusive treatment of the Accused

The Accused’s...