Saturday, March 04, 2006
Lim Hock Soon Murder
Wed 15 Feb was quite the shock: an early morning gangland-style murder in Serangoon of Las Vegas Nightclub boss, Lim Hock Soon, 41. Mr Lim and his family were starting out the day when a man holds them up, ties up the family and shoots Mr Lim. Newspapers were using the words 'secret society' and 'triad' freely. Reporters Tanya Fong and Ben Nadarajan profiled the victim as the 'Big Shot With a Low Profile' in the 17 Feb Straits Times. Details of the shooting were also reported in the same Straits Times issue.
Mr Lim's funeral on the 21st was well covered in the press on the 22nd. The New Paper of course covered the funeral from a human interest angle with 'Huat Ah!' on the 22nd by Faith Teo and 'I came to see the xiao jie' on the 23rd by Low Ching Ling.
Judging by the execution-style operation, I suspected that the murderer was across the Causeway within an hour of the killing. That was proved right when news broke on the 26th that the suspected murderer had been caught in KL. What surprised me was the article in the 27 Feb Straits Times by K C Vijayan reporting that 'Gun murder suspect was tailed from JB'. Apparently, the Malaysian police had spotted him in JB four hours after the murder and had tailed him until the 26th (11 days!) to see who he met. All the earlier stories about a manhunt and a tipoff look like a smokescreen now.
Over the next few days after the arrest of Tan Chor Jin and five other 'associates', papers on both sides of the Causeway linked him to Singapore's 'Ang Soon Tong' or '21 Gang'. Tan, also known as 'One-Eyed Dragon', was described variously as an enforcer, the leader of the Ang Soon Tong, and a bookie. Mention of criminal activities ranging from gun-running, drugs, illegal money-lending, and illegal gambling. One of the others arrested, Ngoi Yew Fatt, is wanted for another murder that happened in Yishun on 2nd Feb 2005. The murder is now said to be an underworld dispute over gambling money.
Newspapers have been covering the story more or less constantly with dramatic rendition of details like Tan's return to Singapore on an SIA flight and his being brought back to the scene of the murder ("heart-rending screams pierced the air"? Ouch!).
Mr Lim's funeral on the 21st was well covered in the press on the 22nd. The New Paper of course covered the funeral from a human interest angle with 'Huat Ah!' on the 22nd by Faith Teo and 'I came to see the xiao jie' on the 23rd by Low Ching Ling.
Judging by the execution-style operation, I suspected that the murderer was across the Causeway within an hour of the killing. That was proved right when news broke on the 26th that the suspected murderer had been caught in KL. What surprised me was the article in the 27 Feb Straits Times by K C Vijayan reporting that 'Gun murder suspect was tailed from JB'. Apparently, the Malaysian police had spotted him in JB four hours after the murder and had tailed him until the 26th (11 days!) to see who he met. All the earlier stories about a manhunt and a tipoff look like a smokescreen now.
Over the next few days after the arrest of Tan Chor Jin and five other 'associates', papers on both sides of the Causeway linked him to Singapore's 'Ang Soon Tong' or '21 Gang'. Tan, also known as 'One-Eyed Dragon', was described variously as an enforcer, the leader of the Ang Soon Tong, and a bookie. Mention of criminal activities ranging from gun-running, drugs, illegal money-lending, and illegal gambling. One of the others arrested, Ngoi Yew Fatt, is wanted for another murder that happened in Yishun on 2nd Feb 2005. The murder is now said to be an underworld dispute over gambling money.
Newspapers have been covering the story more or less constantly with dramatic rendition of details like Tan's return to Singapore on an SIA flight and his being brought back to the scene of the murder ("heart-rending screams pierced the air"? Ouch!).
