Top eye specialist guilty of road rage incident has depressive disorder, was kidnapped as a child, court told

SINGAPORE — A veteran eye specialist, who heads the ophthalmology department at JurongHealth Campus, pleaded guilty on Wednesday (Feb 19) to tailgating a Grab driver’s car and throwing an unopened wine bottle at the private hire driver’s vehicle last year.

Lennard Harold Thean See Yin’s psychiatrist told a district court on Wednesday that at the time of the incident, Thean had not been diagnosed with major depressive disorder — possibly stemming from a traumatic kidnapping attempt when he was four years old.

Thean, 55, suffered from “morbid fears of mortality” and entertained suicidal thoughts, Dr Stephen Phang testified.

Thean, who is also a senior consultant at Ng Teng Fong General Hospital and Jurong Medical Centre, admitted on Wednesday to committing a rash act endangering the personal safety of the other driver, Mr Martin Lu.

District Judge Marvin Bay called for a report to assess his suitability for a mandatory treatment order. This is a community sentencing option offered to offenders suffering from mental conditions that contributed to the offence.

Thean is set to be sentenced on March 18, when another charge of using threatening behaviour with intent to cause alarm to Mr Lu will be considered for sentencing.

The judge told the court that while his actions were “wholly impulsive and intemperate” on the surface, he accepted Dr Phang’s testimony that he was triggered as a result of his mental illness.

The bottle did not shatter the other car’s windscreen or damage it either, which might have led to the driver or his passenger getting injured, District Judge Bay added.

Thean’s lawyer Leo Cheng Suan argued that his depressive disorder was treatable and that the incident was “entirely out of character” for him.

PERSISTENTLY PURSUED VICTIM

The court heard that on the night of March 18 last year, Grab driver Martin Lu picked up two passengers who wanted to go to Queen Astrid Park, located around the Bukit Timah area.

On the way there, Mr Lu stopped about two metres beyond the stop line at the entrance to a roundabout along Coronation Road West. 

Thean, who was coming from Mr Lu’s right and had the right of way, was forced to brake to avoid any potential accident. He sounded his horn and Mr Lu waved his hand in apology before entering the roundabout and driving on.

Angered by Mr Lu’s driving, Thean pursued him while repeatedly sounding his horn for at least 20 seconds.

Mr Lu’s passengers alighted about a minute later at their house, which was close to a dead end. As they alighted, Thean pulled up next to Mr Lu’s car and wound down his window while shouting and gesturing aggressively at him.

Wanting to avoid a confrontation, Mr Lu drove closer to the dead end, intending to make a three-point turn to head back.

However, Thean followed closely beside him, cutting off his space. Mr Lu responded by accelerating and suddenly braking so that Thean would be ahead of him.

“The victim then quickly reversed his car to create space between his car and the accused’s car in order to make the three-point turn. Seeing that, the accused himself hastily made a three-point turn and accelerated forward to block the victim’s path,” Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Kumaresan Gohulabalan told the court.

Mr Lu, however, managed to create enough space to turn. As he did so, Thean continued inching towards him and then threw an unopened glass wine bottle at the rear of Mr Lu’s car when the other man finished the turn.

The bottle hit the left tail light. Mr Lu briefly stopped and thought about whether to alight to inspect the damage but drove away as he did not want to fight with Thean.

Thean however pursued Mr Lu for another minute till they got to the earlier roundabout again.

Anticipating that Mr Lu would turn right, Thean overtook him and turned right, driving against the flow of traffic at the roundabout. Mr Lu quickly turned left to escape and drove to a small alley to check his car.

He lodged a police report two days later.

Thean has since fully compensated S$2,140 for repairs to Mr Lu’s car. 

REMEMBERS KIDNAPPING ATTEMPT VIVIDLY

Dr Phang, a senior consultant at the Institute of Mental Health, took the stand to clarify parts of his psychiatric report on Thean. He had assessed Thean’s mental state after the incident and began formally treating him in July last year.

Calling it a “rather complex” case, the psychiatrist revealed that Thean told him about having separation anxiety as an only child.

In 1969, he was abducted from his kindergarten and “placed in fear of his own mortality”, Dr Phang said. 

The kidnappers eventually returned Thean to his home after driving their car off the road into a monsoon drain. They were arrested and charged in court for their offences.

“(His memories are) so vivid to this day that he can still taste the mint sweet that kidnappers gave him to keep him quiet in the back seat of his car… He told me he still has a scar in his mouth from the broken glass. He plays it like a video in his mind even today, five decades down the road,” Dr Phang added.

The road rage incident probably “triggered his traumatic memories”, the psychiatrist said, and caused him to fear for his and his son’s lives. His son was in the car during the incident.

Thean also had family issues and once thought of killing himself after an argument “over a very trivial domestic issue”.

Nevertheless, he was able to function and became a qualified doctor. He is also not a danger to his patients, Dr Phang noted.

He added that while Thean experienced difficulties during his earlier years, he “spiralled down” in the two years before the road incident. 

When asked by DPP Kumaresan on how Thean’s memories were related to him tailgating the other driver in a “slightly reckless” manner, Dr Phang replied that his mental illness caused him to be increasingly irritable.

“It’s clear that he had reached the outer limits of his outer resilience and started to break down,” he added.