Ng Beng Kee
| Ng Beng Kee | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1 January 1941 Singapore |
| 💀Died | 26 May 1989 (aged 48) Changi Prison, Singapore26 May 1989 (aged 48) |
| 🏳️ Nationality | Singaporean |
| 💼 Occupation | Painting contractor |
| Criminal status | Executed |
Ng Beng Kee (1 January 1941 - 26 May 1989) was a Singaporean national executed in Singapore for drug trafficking. The 27 kilograms of heroin he was jointly convicted of trafficking was the largest amount of heroin by weight seized by authorities in Singapore at the time of his prosecution.[1]
Biography[edit]
Born in Singapore in 1941, Ng Beng Kee was working as a painting contractor at the time of his arrest.
Arrest at Havelock Road[edit]
Early on the morning of 6 October 1982, Ng Beng Kee and his accomplice Tan Hock Bin were arrested with 27.3kg of heroin in the car park of the Apollo Hotel in Havelock Road. It was believed the drugs were smuggled into Singapore by speedboat and were due to be brought to Hong Kong via ship, and Singapore was not the final destination.
Alleged by narcotics officers to be the head of a secret society, Ng was described as the organizer of a Hong Kong based international drugs syndicate that had connections in Malaysia and Thailand. Tan was described as his right hand man within the drugs syndicate.[2] Ng had previously been hiding in Malaysia, until Central Narcotics Bureau officers spotted him in Singapore and then placed him under surveillance. Central Narcotics Bureau agents had been investigating the syndicate for over six months before they moved in to make an arrest.[3]
Following the pair's capture, 40 other members of the same syndicate were arrested in Malaysia and Singapore.
Trial[edit]
On 21 October 1985, Deputy Public Prosecutor Michael Khoo stated Ng and Tan were arrested after moving 20.4kg of pure heroin, with an estimated street value of over $32 million, from Bukit Panjang village to the car park of the Apollo Hotel in Havelock Road. This was by far the largest amount of heroin ever seized by Singaporean authorities up until that date in time.
The court heard how eight plainclothes Central Narcotics Bureau officers on 4 motorcycles followed a red Hyundai Pony car, driven by Tan, for a distance of 47 kilometers on the night in question. Chief narcotics officer Teo Ho Peng and three other officers first followed the car from about 5:50pm, when Ng and Tan started their journey from a car park in Holland Close. The car drove 15 kilometers on a circuitous route, before stopping at the President Merlin Hotel on Kitchener Road, where another two men got in. The car drove on another 15 kilometers back to Bukit Panjang village, where Ng and Tan got out and the car drove off with the other two men still inside. About 30 minutes later the car returned, the two men got out and Ng and Tan then drove away in it. The officers followed them to the car park of the Apollo Hotel in Havelock Road. When the car stopped, Ng opened the boot and Tan took out a cardboard box. At this point the narcotics officers moved in and identified themselves. Ng ran off but was subsequently detained along with Tan. A search revealed 60 plastic packets of white powder, later determined to be heroin, hidden inside two biscuit tins in the boot of their car and inside the cardboard box.[4]
On 29 October 1985, while taking the stand in his own defence, Ng admitted he was a member of an international drugs syndicate and that the heroin seized on the day in question belonged to him. He described how on the afternoon of 5 October 1982, he arrived in Singapore from Johor Baru as a passenger in a taxi cab. That evening, he telephoned Tan at his Holland Close apartment and asked him to help move "something" the next morning. At 7pm Ng then travelled to an apartment in Telok Blangah to meet other members of his syndicate, who were to manage the transportation of the drugs onwards to Hong Kong. He met his best friend there, who had a nickname of Pai Tow Hock. Ng asked for an advance of $10,000 from Pai, and confirmed the heroin was due to arrive the following morning, when another syndicate member named Tay Kor would deliver the drugs to Pai's apartment. Shortly after Tay telephoned the men, and Ng then went to meet him at his Bukit Merah apartment. Ng confirmed the heroin shipment would arrive at 3am. Ng claimed Tay received a phone call where he became nervous speaking to whoever was on the line, finally telling the caller he would take him "to a show at 3 o' clock".[5]
Tay then produced a bag containing currency notes of American dollars, Malaysian ringgit and Singapore dollars. Ng claimed there were also two guns in the bag, one of which was offered to him by Tay, but Ng turned down the offer as he felt there was no need to be armed. Ng instructed Tay to wait for his phone call the following morning along with another man named Ma Lau. The next day, Ng had Tan drive him and two other men to Bukit Panjang village on the pretext of collecting some Korean ginseng smuggled in from Malaysia. Ng testified that Tan did not know that heroin was being transported in the car. Arriving at the Apollo Hotel, Ng spotted Ma Lau standing beside Pai's Datsun pickup truck in the car park. Ng claimed that Ma suddenly signaled to narcotics officers, and he and Tan were then arrested.
On 30 October 1985, while under cross examination by Deputy Public Prosecutor Michael Khoo, Ng claimed he was due to receive a commission of HK$8 million if he succeeded in smuggling the approximately 27kgs of heroin to Hong Kong. Although he had to pay any incidental expenses himself, he would have got a 20 percent commission after the sale of the drugs, which he estimated would command a price of HK$40 million. Ng described himself as the person who arranged how and when the drugs are transported to their final destination. Ng further stated that the heroin had been transported to Singapore from Bukit Mertajam by a businessman named Ah Or, who owned a fleet of 10 lorries. The businessman was a member of the Malaysian arm of the syndicate, according to Ng. The actual owner of the drugs was a man named Ah Lim, but the person who ultimatly lost out from its seizure was a towkay located in Hat Yai in Thailand, Ng stated.[6]
Ng described how he travelled to Hong Kong in the summer of 1982 to finalize the arrangements for the shipment. Although he had a Singapore passport, he used a Malaysian passport on the trip, so as to keep his Singaporean passport clear of any suspicious travel records. The Malaysian passport was in the name of a dead person named Ng Ah Kow. In mid September 1982, Ng claimed he and Tan drove to Bukit Mertajam to meet Ah Or and Ah Lim, to arrange the shipment of the heroin to Singapore and onwards to Hong Kong in early October. Ng stated that Tan was not aware the true reason for the trip was to organize the transportation of illegal drugs via Singapore.
Ng agreed with the prosecutor that he had previously travelled twice to Hong Kong in late 1981 and early 1982 to organize the transportation of a separate shipment of 73kgs of heroin, but authorities in Hong Kong had seized the drugs on their arrival. Ng had already testified that on the night of his arrest, he had a conversation with Central Narcotics Bureau director Poh Geok Ek regarding the Hong Kong seizure, where he admitted that shipment of drugs were his.[7] Ng also agreed that Ah Lim had lost faith in him after the failure of this smuggling run, but denied that as a result he persuaded Tan to approach Ah Lim regarding the heroin seized at the Apollo Hotel or that the consignment was due to be handled by Tan's contacts and not his own.
On 30 September 1985, while taking the stand in his own defence, Tan testified he thought the contents of the boot of his car was Korean ginseng and that he was merely doing his friend of 4 years Ng a favor. He only realized he was carrying heroin after he and Ng were arrested by Central Narcotics Bureau officers at the Apollo Hotel car park. Although he admitted accompanying Ng on the trip to Bukit Mertajam, Tan denied knowing that the purpose of the visit was to finalize a plan for the trafficking of drugs into Singapore. Deputy Public Prosecutor Michael Khoo submitted that at the very least Tan was helping Ng in transporting the drugs for the purpose of transferring possession to other syndicate members in the Apollo Hotel car park. He further asserted that the plan was conceived by Ng along with Malaysians Ah Or and Ah Lim, and the plan was finalized during a meeting in Bukit Mertajam in September 1982, which Tan himself attended. [8]
Deputy Public Prosecutor Michael Khoo highlighted Ng's testimony on how the Malaysian syndicate members had lost faith in him after the earlier shipment of 73kg of heroin was intercepted by the Hong Kong authorities. He found it unlikely they would have entrusted Ng with another massive shipment of heroin, unless they had assurance the next trafficking attempt would run smoothly. This is the reason why Tan attended the September 1982 meeting in Bukit Mertajam, he asserted. Taking all the facts together, Deputy Public Prosecutor Michael Khoo submitted that the only inference that can be drawn is that Tan had full knowledge of the contents of the car boot, and that there had been a pre arranged plan involving both of the accused, along with others, to transport the drugs seized at the Apollo Hotel car park. Tan and Ng were acting pursuant to that plan on the day of their arrest in October 1982.
Verdict[edit]
On 1 November 1985, Ng and Tan were both found guilty as charged and sentenced to death for the trafficking of 20.4 kilograms of pure heroin, contrary to Section 5 of the Misuse of Drugs Act.[9] In a 35 page judgement, judge Abdul Wahab Ghows dismissed Tan's defence as a "pack of lies", highlighting that his claim of thinking there was only ginseng in the car boot was offered only recently and not at the time of his arrest or at any time over the 3 years it took for the case to come to court.
Noting that Tan testified to working as an unlicensed money lender in a gambling den, the judge asserted he would have had to have been shrewd and tough to survive in that line of business, so the court did not believe Tan was the obedient and gullible person he pretended to be on the day of his arrest. The court was satisfied Tan knew the heroin would be delivered that day and that he had actively been involved in setting up the transfer the month before with Ng and Ah Or. The court also recognized that Ng had previously confirmed he always knew the car contained heroin and that the drugs were under his control.[10]
Appeal[edit]
On 7 July 1987, the Appeal Court rejected Ng and Tan's appeal against their conviction. Tan's defence lawyer Peter Fernando contended that the original trial judges were wrong to reject Ng's testimony that Tan was not a syndicate member and had no knowledge of the heroin discovered in his car boot. Ng's defence lawyer P Suppiah contended that although his admissions during the trial were too damming to argue otherwise, Ng's defence should not have been called because the prosecution had not established that Ng knew the boot of the car contained drugs by the time they had finished presenting their evidence to the court. However, Chief Justice Wee Chong Jin dismissed their arguments, remarking that "there are no merits at all in the appeal".[11]
Execution[edit]
Ng Beng Kee and Tan Hock Bin were both hanged at Changi Prison on the morning of 26 May 1989.[12]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ↑ "Round-the-clock probe led to 23-kg heroin haul". The Straits Times. 6 November 1988.
- ↑ "Two drug traffickers hanged in Changi". Straits Times (Overseas edition). 27 May 1989.
- ↑ "$32 m drug haul by CNB". The Straits Times. 7 October 1982.
- ↑ "Two accused tailed for 47 km". The Straits Times. 22 October 1985.
- ↑ "Best friend betrayed me, says Ng". The Straits Times. 30 October 1985.
- ↑ "Ng: I was to get $2.7 m if drugs had been delivered". The Straits Times. 31 October 1985.
- ↑ "I want to tell all, says Ng in outburst". The Straits Times. 25 October 1985.
- ↑ "$32m heroin trafficking trial I thought I had ginseng in my car — accused". The Straits Times. 1 November 1985.
- ↑ "Death for two in $32m drugs case". The Straits Times. 2 November 1985.
- ↑ "Defence a pack of lies — judges". The Straits Times. 2 November 1985.
- ↑ "Two lose appeal against death". The Straits Times. 11 July 1987.
- ↑ "Two drug traffickers hanged in Changi". Straits Times (Overseas edition). 27 May 1989.
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