Alex Josey - Cold blooded murders

The Judge said that the prosecution’s case was that the ensuing wholesale destruction of Pulau Senang, the killing of the four prison staff, ‘stems from the incident of the 13 carpenters who refused to work overtime on that Saturday afternoon’.

The Judge agreed with Major James that it was an ill-advised action on the part of Dutton. “To say that the subsequent action taken by the detainees concerned to avenge what they thought was an injustice was out of all proportion to the occasion is, I think, a masterpiece of understatement.”

Four witnesses said they overheard Tan Kheng Ann, Chia Yuan Fatt and Cheong Wai Sang and two others (all of whom were said to hold high positions in their respective secret societies) plot to kill Dutton on 6 July. Chia told one of the carpenters: “Do not worry. We will settle accounts with Dutton and liquidate him.” “That meeting on 6 July was where this conspiracy to kill Dutton, to carry out some incidents when he was on the island, was first hatched… ”

The defence had described the evidence against the plotters as ‘a tissue of falsehood engendered by spite and by a desire for release’.

The Judge discussed the categories of witnesses called by the prosecution. A large number of them were fellow detainees. There were also ex-detainees who had become settlement attendants ‘who had, so to speak, graduated out from Pulau Senang to the Work Brigade and were then taken back as rehabilitated members of society’. The Judge warned that evidence of fellow detainees, ex-detainees and long-sentence prisoners required careful scrutiny, attention and examination. Their evidence must be considered with care and caution. In some instances, they were members of rival gangs to which some of the accused were members. He warned that the evidence of one accomplice cannot be used to corroborate the evidence of another accomplice.

One witness, Chong Sek Ling, was not in the Judge’s view an accomplice. “He appeared to co-operate with Tan Kheng Ann when the plot to kill Dutton and destroy Pulau Senang was being hatched but only, if you accept his evidence, to obtain information to pass on to Dutton. Thereafter he took no part whatever in the subsequent uprising. The fact that he helped himself to some food in the canteen, is not in my view sufficient to constitute him an accomplice in this crime. That is a matter which you must consider… ”

“Chong Sek Ling said he saw Corporal Choo on the ground and Quek Hai Cheng using his body to cover him and protect him from the blows… Chong then went to the kitchen as he felt certain apparently at that stage that there would be no food that night, and like a sensible man, he said he wanted to equip himself for the long ordeal ahead. He had already, you may think, made a very sound and accurate appraisal of the situation. It is small wonder perhaps that he has risen to the rank of General Headman of Group 18, one of the highest ranks a secret society man can attain. You may think he was a person of considerable resource and initiative who, in any other walk of life, might have well been regarded as an elder statesman, or if at school, a head prefect, and it is a sorry reflection that he should have attained his ambition in the ranks of a secret society.”

The Judge said that the detainees had affection for Chong-trusted him… looked upon him as a sort of elder statesman in their hierarchy of gangsterism. Chong denied he was an informer. He said he was spying on the accused to inform Dutton. He gave his evidence, he told the Court, not in the hope of getting release. He said he had wanted to help Dutton because Dutton was fair in the release of detainees. Dutton gave the detainees equal treatment, ‘rich or poor, influential or uninfluential’. He admitted that the detainees confided in him because they had an affection for him.

The Judge said that Chan Wah and Sim Hoe Seng had climbed to the roof. Chan had chopped a hole with a small axe. Sim poured in the petrol and set it alight. Dutton opened the wire door and rushed out, his clothing on fire, to be confronted by four armed detainees-Chia Yeow Fatt, Lim Tee Kang, Khoo Geok San and Sim Teck Beng. They attacked him. By the time he fell, there were 10 to 20 detainees round him. ‘Let’s bury him near the jetty,’ shouted one. Another was heard to say: ‘Just kill him and set him on fire. Don’t trouble to carry him to the jetty.’

“One witness said that Tan Kheng Ann was well-known to be Dutton’s favourite and he went with Dutton when Dutton did survey work. Everyone suspected Tan to be Dutton’s informer. Now doesn’t that again tie in, in the most remarkable fashion, with Quek Hai Cheng’s evidence of Hoe Hock Hai raising Tan’s hand and saying ‘Don’t misunderstand him. He is not an informer’. Was this not one way in which Tan was vindicating himself to his colleagues who, according to Quek Hai Cheng, all suspected him of being Dutton’s informer, by being perhaps, one of the prime movers in his death? Doesn’t that explain the cry of Lim Kim Chuan? He proved himself-that he was not an informer-by killing Dutton.”

Quek Hai Cheng claimed that when Corporal Choo fell down and Tan Kheng Ann was about to slash him with a parang, Quek threw himself over Corporal Choo’s body to protect him. His reason for doing so was that Corporal Choo was a very nice man, married with children while he himself was a gangster and prepared to sacrifice his life for Corporal Choo. And in his evidence Corporal Choo said that is exactly what he did. He claimed later that he was pretending to attack Tailford while actually trying to ward off the blows being rained on Tailford with a stick.

The Judge remarked that if on 6 July the 13 carpenters had set to work with a will, they could have repaired the moulds on the jetty in about 20 minutes.

Reviewing the defence, the Judge pointed out that 44 of the 58 accused said nothing in their defence; they remained silent; 11 went into the box and made their defence on oath, three made unsworn statements from the dock…

“Now, because an accused person has elected to remain silent or to make an unsworn statement from the dock you must not draw any adverse inference against him. It is a course which the law expressly provides that he may adopt. The proper way, I suggest, to treat the position of an accused remaining silent is this: that the accused is in effect saying to the prosecution: You must prove your case against me. Unless and until you have done this there is nothing for me to answer. And in such a case you are left with the prosecution’s evidence. An accused person who makes an unsworn statement from the dock cannot be cross-examined but the statement is entitled to, and must receive the most careful scrutiny and attention, for it is his defence in accordance with the law.”

Judge Buttrose pointed out that Tan Kheng Ann had been identified by 30 prosecution witnesses. “Their evidence establishes-if you accept it-that he played a prominent, if not (a) major, role in this uprising. He was one of the original plotters, took part in the attacks on Dutton and Singham which resulted in their deaths. The evidence establishes-if you accept it-that he was a leader of this unlawful assembly from start to finish. Of the thirty witnesses only four bore him a grudge. What the prosecution said was that the cumulative effect of the evidence of all thirty witnesses leads you inexorably and inevitably to one conclusion only: that Tan Kheng Ann is guilty of the offences with which he has been charged.”

Chia Yeow Fatt had been identified by nine witnesses, Cheong Wai Sang by 19 witnesses, Lim Tee Kang by 24 witnesses, Khoo Geok San by 21 witnesses, Hoe Hock Hai was identified by 13 witnesses, Peh Guan Hock by six witnesses, Chia Geok Choo by 18 witnesses.

The Judge referred to a comment by Counsel that it was extraordinary that in such a short space of time, a number of weapons could apparently have passed through the hands of one individual. “Well, I suggest one explanation is that they did not keep these weapons in their hands throughout the uprising. They used them as missiles. They flung them at the settlement attendants. So it was not strange that one accused person was seen with perhaps five or six different weapons in his hands at different times.”