SINGAPORE — A man was sentenced to six years of corrective training nearly eight years after he fled Singapore by paying a Malaysian boatman S$6,000 to avoid jail.

Loh Ping Huang, now 50, had been on bail for beating up a man and leaving him in a vegetative state, when he hit another man with a flowerpot. 

He pleaded guilty last month to a charge each of voluntarily causing grievous hurt, voluntarily causing hurt with a weapon and leaving Singapore at an unauthorised place of embarkation.

He also pleaded guilty to being a member of a secret society from 2010 to 2022, and also for inviting a person to join the gang.

Another six similar charges were taken into consideration during sentencing.

Corrective training is a form of long-term incarceration to reform offenders and correct behaviours. It involves serving jail time for up to 14 years and is generally imposed on recalcitrant offenders who commit serious offences.

Loh's sentence was backdated to Sept 26, 2022 when he was first remanded.

WHAT HAPPENED

According to court documents, Loh was accompanying a woman in her 20s to her home along Lorong 30 Geylang after a night of drinking on June 12, 2015.

At about 7.15am, Loh, who was heavily intoxicated, thought that a man in his 60s was staring at the woman.

Loh shouted at the man to leave, but he did not. The pair got into a verbal argument.

The man picked up a plank and tried to swing it at Loh, but Loh punched the man repeatedly in the face, causing the man to drop the plank.

As a result of the fight, the man was left in a vegetative state up until his death on July 25, 2019.

An autopsy later showed that his death was caused by pneumonia complicated by a head injury. An underlying heart disease was also found to be a contributory cause of death, court documents stated.

Loh was charged on June 13 in 2015 for the attack. While on bail, he got into a fight at a pub in Geylang on July 9, 2016.

During the fight, he picked up a flowerpot and smashed it on a man's head, leaving him with bruises.

Loh decided to flee Singapore sometime in mid-2016 to avoid going to prison for his crimes.

Loh paid a Malaysian boatman S$6,000 to help him leave Singapore illegally. He boarded a boat near the Changi Point Jetty in order to reach Johor, Malaysia.

Court documents did not state how the boat evaded detection by the Singapore authorities.

Loh stayed in Malaysia for about three years before he decided to leave for Vietnam as he feared he would be arrested by Malaysian police and sent back to Singapore.

To get to Vietnam, he stowed away on buses that went through Thailand and Cambodia, stated court documents.

Loh stayed in Vietnam until he was arrested by the Vietnamese authorities and taken back to Singapore on Sept 26, 2022. In total, he was on the run for six years.

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Timotheus Koh called for a corrective training suitability report last month, noting that Loh's "history of lawlessness and violence" and his absconding while court proceedings were ongoing showed the severity of the case.

Loh's past offences include rioting with a deadly weapon and voluntarily causing hurt to a public servant in 2000.

For voluntarily causing grievous hurt, Loh faced up to 10 years' jail and a fine or caning.

For voluntarily causing hurt with a weapon, the penalty is a maximum of seven years' jail, fine and caning

For being part of a secret society, Loh could have been jailed for three years or fined S$5,000, or both.

For leaving Singapore at an unauthorised place of embarkation, he could have been jailed up to six months or fined S$2,000, or both.