A man in Singapore has been jailed after he was caught stealing from a dead person.
52-year old Ng Hoe Ghee found the dead 22-year old man at the foot of a building and stole his belongings, CNA reported.
After Ng had stolen these items, he discarded several important pieces of evidence for police investigations pertaining to the young man’s death,
According to the court documents, Ng discovered the young man’s corpse on August 12 2023 at around 1.20pm and covered the body with a piece of cardboard and then took his wallet which fell nearby.
Moments later, police arrived at the scene and Ng told them what he had seen and handed the wallet to them.
Investigations revealed that the deceased had visited a family member and then jumped from a high level of the building. He was carrying a haversack prior to his death.
Curious about his death, Ng went to the 15th floor of the building, then on a higher floor, he found the dead man’s haversack and decided hid it in a box, then placed it outside his father’s flat.
The haversack contained a laptop, two mobile phones, notebooks and several other items, per Ng’s findings the next day.
While looking through the notebooks, he found some troubling notes penned by the deceased, stating that he was “feeling pain and was struggling with his belief and faith” on top of feeling “haunted” by something or someone.
Ng only kept the electronics found in the haversack and discarded the other items including the disturbing notes. He then paid S$70 (RM247.81) for someone to reset the password-protected phones, removed the SIM cards and began using one of the phones.
During their investigation of the 22-year-old’s death, the police issued a gazette looking for Ng to assist in their investigations as they could not locate him.
On Sep 7 2023, police approached Ng during a routine check in East Jurong, and realised that a gazette was issued for him. The stolen items were recovered in no time after he was referred to the investigating officer for the dead 22-year old man’s case.
The 52-year old pleaded guilty to one count each for dishonest misappropriation of property and dishonest misappropriation of a deceased person’s property.
Ng had apologised for his crimes during the mitigation of his sentence, citing financial troubles and justified discarding the dead man’s personal notes as his struggles should not be made known to the public.
On Feb 7 this year, he was sentenced to four months and four weeks jail.
