Singaporean woman dead in England: Husband admits to manslaughter

SINGAPORE — A Singaporean man has admitted to the manslaughter of his wife, while they were on holiday in England last year. 

Fong Soong Hert, 50, pleaded guilty to manslaughter last Friday (March 18), but he denied a charge of murdering his wife, Madam Pek Ying Ling, who was aged 51. 

Prosecutors have not accepted his manslaughter indictment at the moment, the Newcastle Crown Court told TODAY in an email on Tuesday.

He remains remanded in custody until the trial, which is scheduled to begin on June 6. 

Pek was found dead on Dec 6 last year at the County Aparthotel, a four-star hotel on Westgate Road in Newcastle, north-east England

The Northumbria police received a “a report of concern” at 3.15pm Singapore time (or 7.15am Greenwich Mean Time) that day for a woman at the address of a hotel on Westgate Road.

Pek was not breathing when she was found and she was later pronounced dead at the scene by the authorities, British broadcasters ITV and BBC said at the time. 

Her husband was arrested that morning as a suspect.

In a joint family statement a few days later, the couple’s three sons said that they were “supposed to meet up for a family holiday”.

“The whole situation is a huge shock to us,” they said.

The couple used to work together at an events management firm in Singapore and had been married for nearly 30 years, with family members describing the couple as "very loving", Singapore’s national daily The Straits Times reported. 

They had met their oldest son in Newcastle during their holiday there, with plans to meet their two other children later on the same trip. 

The couple's youngest son, 24-year-old Alex Fong told The Straits Times that on Dec 6, the day of the alleged crime, his father collapsed thrice in 18 hours and his mother had called an ambulance to take him to the hospital. 

Several hours later, Mr Alex Fong received a call from his brother informing him of his mother's death. 

When TODAY contacted Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in December, the ministry said that it was aware of Pek's death and expressed "heartfelt condolences to the family in their time of grief”.

The maximum penalty for either murder or manslaughter in Britain is life imprisonment.