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Father leaves children parting note after killing wife in Novena Suites case

SINGAPORE — He left behind handwritten notes asking his two children to “obey (your mother) and look after each other” before jumping to his death in full view of them, but they later found their mother lying motionless in the toilet of their father’s apartment, stabbed dead by him.

Novena Suites. Photo: Wee Teck Hian/TODAY

Novena Suites. Photo: Wee Teck Hian/TODAY

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SINGAPORE — He left behind handwritten notes asking his two children to “obey (your mother) and look after each other” before jumping to his death in full view of them, but they later found their mother lying motionless in the toilet of their father’s apartment, stabbed dead by him.

The couple were living apart at the time.

Wang Chan Foo, 46, had been struggling with insomnia and other symptoms of depression for more than a year before killing his 44-year-old wife, Ng Soo San, and taking his own life on Oct 22 last year.

While it was noted that Wang used to verbally and physically abuse his wife in the past, prompting her to move out with their children, State Coroner Marvin Bay on Wednesday (March 22) said that Wang’s murder-suicide act was not premeditated.

Delivering his findings on the double deaths, Mr Bay ruled that they were impulsive acts committed by Wang due to unknown reasons.

Since 2012, Wang had been living separately from Ng and their children.

On the day of the deaths, the couple were together in Wang’s private apartment at Novena Suites along Moulmein Road — just as they would usually be on a Saturday afternoon.

Their daughter, then aged 13, and son, aged seven, would attend tuition classes in Velocity mall at Novena Square, and Ng would pick them up after classes.

When she failed to do so that day, Wang told his children to return to Novena Suites on their own, only for them to witness his suicide.

Acting on a neighbour’s call, the police arrived at Wang’s unit on the 13th floor at around 7pm to see him in a daze and squatting on a balcony ledge. Ignoring pleas from police officers and a neighbour to step back in, he fell off at 7.12pm and was later pronounced dead.

An airbag could not be deployed at the site “due to the structure of the building”, an investigation officer told the court on Wednesday.

Ng was later found with eight stab wounds over her body — the deepest being 14cm, on her chest.

State Coroner Bay said that there was also no basis to suspect that any third party was involved in the “impulsive and disorganised act”, he said, adding that interviews with the couple’s next-of-kin and neighbours did not uncover anything suspicious.

However, Mr Bay found that the unemployed man had “wrestled with the notion of ending his life”.

Part of a note to his children found in his apartment read: “When papa is no longer around one day, please listen to (your) mum. Obey her & look after each other. Also, (please) study hard for your own future.”

A month before the incident, Wang was sent to the hospital after he overdosed on sleeping pills and red wine.

The couple got married in 2003 and three years later, Wang started to show violent tendencies towards Ng, the court heard.

Ng sought help from a Family Service Centre in 2011, but she decided against taking up a personal protection order “as she was afraid of her husband’s reaction”, the court was told.

She chose to move out with their children and that seemed to “stabilise” the relationship, Mr Bay said. The family got together on weekends and even made plans to go on a cruise holiday last November.

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