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Police will spare no effort to solve Kovan murder case, says DPM Teo

SINGAPORE — The police will spare no effort to make sure that justice is served in the Kovan murder case, said Deputy Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister Teo Chee Hean yesterday.

SINGAPORE — The police will spare no effort to make sure that justice is served in the Kovan murder case, said Deputy Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister Teo Chee Hean yesterday.

In a rare statement on an individual crime by the Home Affairs Minister, Mr Teo described the murder as “shocking” and extended his sympathies to the family of the deceased.

“This is a very serious case and the Commissioner of Police has been updating me regularly. I have asked the police to spare no effort to make sure that justice is served,” he added.

On Wednesday afternoon, 67-year-old Tan Boon Sin was found murdered in his home at Hillside Drive. The body of his elder son, 42-year-old Tan Chee Heong, was found outside Kovan MRT Station after being dragged under a silver Camry, which belonged to the elder Tan.

An eyewitness had seen a “fat, short” man dressed in an orange-and-white striped polo tee and bluish-grey jeans drive the Camry out of the house. There were no blood stains on the man, who looked to be in his 50s or 60s, she said.

While the car was found on Thursday at a carpark at Block 1084, Eunos Avenue 7A — a kilometre away from where the elder Tan’s workshop was formerly located — no arrests related to the case have been made thus far.

According to a Lianhe Wanbao report, the elder Tan, a fishing enthusiast, was said to have retrieved valuables from a safe box along Paya Lebar Road an hour before the murder took place. Other media reports said a dispute, possibly over money matters, is believed to have led to the killings.

The elder Tan has been involved in three companies, according to records from the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority.

Besides his current car workshop business, Soc Leon Motor Works, which he set up in 1975 with another partner who has now retired, the elder Tan was also involved in a motor repair and spray painting business which he sold in 1996.

He was also involved in a business dealing with general wholesale trade and renovation, which he withdrew as a director in July 2002, three months after he was appointed.

The son, who was the Director and a shareholder of Aspern Singapore, an electronics products company, was described by neighbours to be a family man who would take his sons cycling around the neighbourhood.

According to his neighbour, Mr Raphael Teo said Mr Tan was a University of Western Australia graduate. “Once, when I was still deciding which university to go to, he (Mr Tan) gave me advice on what to do and where to go,” said Mr Teo, 21.

Another neighbour, a retiree who wanted to be known as Mrs Goh, said Mr Tan would always hold the lift door for the elderly. “This kind of crime is so senseless,” she added.

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