Woman who fatally abused maid and starved her till she weighed 24kg seeks reduction of charge, gag order

• Gaiyathiri Murugaiyan, 40, admitted to various acts of abuse that killed 24-year-old Piang Ngaih Don in 2016
• Prosecutors sought the maximum sentence of life imprisonment
• Her new lawyer said that she wants to further reduce her charge of culpable homicide to the same charge under a less serious sub-section of the Penal Code
• She is also seeking a gag order for a blanket prohibition on further reporting on the case

SINGAPORE — A 40-year-old woman, who pleaded guilty earlier this year to viciously abusing her domestic worker almost daily over nine months till she died in 2016, is seeking a further reduction of her charge to escape a potential life imprisonment sentence. 

Gaiyathiri Murugaiyan will also be asking the court to impose a gag order prohibiting further reporting on the case, her new lawyer Joseph Chen said on Thursday (April 29).

Gaiyathiri admitted in February to fatally abusing 24-year-old Myanmarese Piang Ngaih Don.

Mr Chen — who took over from Gaiyathiri’s previous lawyers, Mr Sunil Sudheesan and Ms Diana Ngiam, last month — said that his client would not be retracting her guilty plea but is seeking to reduce her culpable homicide charge, currently under Section 304(a) of the Penal Code, to one under Section 304(b). 

The latter carries a maximum jail term of 10 years, while the former can attract life imprisonment or up to 20 years’ jail, based on the Penal Code provisions that were in force at the time of her offences.

If the prosecution rejects this, Mr Chen said that he will tender a further mitigation plea in a bid to lower her sentence. 

He added that it will focus on “stressors that resulted in her feeling an increased tension due to her worry about her children’s health”, which would reduce the mother-of-two’s culpability for the acts.

Mr Sudheesan and Ms Ngiam had raised this in their earlier mitigation plea, saying that Gaiyathiri struggled with having unrelenting standards for cleanliness and competence at home.

Her son and daughter then fell ill with gastrointestinal issues, which she attributed to Piang’s alleged poor hygiene such as not washing her hands before touching cooking materials, the lawyers added.

As for the gag order, Mr Chen told TODAY that Gaiyathiri wanted to apply for one due to media publicity adversely affecting her children. 

Deputy Chief Prosecutor Mohamed Faizal Mohamed Abdul Kadir said that the prosecution will respond to Mr Chen’s new arguments once he files his further mitigation by May 28.

Justice See Kee Oon told the prosecution to reply by June 14 and tentatively scheduled a next court mention for June 22.

Gaiyathiri remains in remand in the meantime.

THE CASE

The court heard earlier that Gaiyathiri was constantly angry with Piang for perceived unhygienic practices and slowness, physically and verbally abusing the younger woman and depriving her of food and water. 

Piang lost 15kg and weighed just 24kg when she died in the family’s three-bedroom flat along Bishan Street 11 on July 26 in 2016.

An autopsy uncovered 31 recent scars and 47 external injuries scattered all over Piang’s body.

Her hyoid bone — a U-shaped bone in the neck that supports the tongue — was also fractured, most likely from Gaiyathiri holding her by the neck and shaking her like a rag doll, a forensic pathologist found.

Prosecutors previously argued that the case was “especially heinous and especially horrific” enough to warrant life imprisonment.

Gaiyathiri was originally charged with murder, which carries the possibility of the death penalty, but the prosecution reduced it to culpable homicide on account of her mental condition.

After her arrest, she was diagnosed with major depressive disorder and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, which had substantially contributed to her committing the offences, a psychiatrist found.

Her former lawyers also said that she suffered from postnatal depression that set in around February 2015.

Gaiyathiri, who was unemployed at the time, pleaded guilty to 28 charges in February. 

These included culpable homicide not amounting to murder, wrongful restraint and causing hurt or grievous hurt to Piang.

The prosecution had played several clips from the closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras Gaiyathiri installed at various parts of her flat to monitor Piang and her own two young children. 

The clips showed several instances of the abuse including Gaiyathiri dragging Piang by the hair.

She had grown unhappy with Piang early on in her employment, establishing a strict set of rules involving hygiene and order in the three-bedroom flat and expecting Piang to adhere to them.

Gaiyathiri began abusing her verbally by shouting at her but this escalated to physical abuse from October 2015 onwards.

Gaiyathiri would assault her almost every day, either alone or allegedly with her mother Prema S Naraynasamy, and often several times a day. 

Gaiyathiri’s husband, suspended police staff sergeant Kevin Chelvam, 42, and Prema, 61, also face multiple charges related to the abuse. Their cases are before the courts.

Chelvam had allegedly removed the CCTV digital video recorder system installed in the flat and purportedly lied to investigators that their tenants had requested this six months earlier.