SINGAPORE — The case of the topless body of a decapitated woman fished out of Sungei Whampoa on Thursday is being investigated as murder, the police said yesterday. They had initially classified the case as one of unnatural death.

The police were called in just after sunrise that day after two women spotted the grisly sight of a leg sticking out of a black trash bag floating in the canal near McNair Road and St George’s Lane. When the body of a woman with a tanned complexion was pulled out, it was clad only in a pair of black pants and both its hands were understood to be missing.

Divers from the the Singapore Civil Defence Force waded into the ankle-deep waters to conduct a search for around 30 minutes. However, the body’s head and hands have not been found thus far, TODAY understands.

Residents in the area reportedly said they did not notice anything unusual the previous night, raising questions whether the body had been dumped there or had floated from elsewhere. Sungei Whampoa starts near Jalan Rajah, which is off Balestier Road, and links to Kallang River near Kallang Bahru. It is not the first time a mutilated body has been found.

In 2005, factory supervisor Leong Siew Chor dismembered the body of his lover, China national Liu Hong Mei, 22, and threw her body parts into the Kallang and Singapore rivers. The 50-year-old was hanged for Liu’s murder.

Three months later, Filipino maid Guen Garlejo Aguilar chopped up the body of her friend Jane Parangan La Puebla and dumped her body parts outside Orchard MRT station and at MacRitchie Reservoir. She was jailed for 10 years.