Guen Aguilar

Case information

Guen Garlejo Aguilar was a Filipino domestic worker. She pleaded guilty and was convicted of culpable homicide not amounting to murder (section 304(a) of the Penal Code) after charges were reduced from murder to manslaughter.

Timeline

• 7 September 2005 — At about 12.35 p.m. at Block 9 #08-23 Serangoon Avenue 2, Sunglade, Singapore, Guen Garlejo Aguilar caused the death of Jane Parangan La Puebla by strangling her on the neck with both her hands, with the intention of causing her death.
• 7 September 2005 — At about 12.45 p.m., a street cleaner made a discovery next to the Orchard Road MRT station and found a severed human head in a bag.
• 8 September 2005 — A missing person’s report stated that Jane Parangan La Puebla had been missing since 7 September 2005.
• 9 September 2005 — 1.53 p.m. Police arrived at the Orchard Road MRT station scene and cordoned off the place; the bag contained pages from The Straits Times dated 8 September 2005.
• 9 September 2005 — 6.10 p.m. Police received a call about an unattended “World Polo” suitcase with flies found at MacRitchie Reservoir; the torso was found wrapped in garbage bags and head and limbs were missing.
• 9 September 2005 — The accused was charged with murder after police identified her by fingerprints lifted from the hands found in the sports bag.
• 10 September 2005 — At about 12.40 a.m., the accused was placed under arrest for the murder of the deceased.
• 10 September 2005 — At 10.33 a.m., Dr Ian Jay Basiao Tan of Alexandra Hospital examined the accused and noted the accused’s injuries.
• 13 September 2005 — The accused gave a second statement admitting she had had a fight with the deceased that culminated in her demise.
• 18 May 2006 — The accused pleaded guilty to the reduced charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder under s 304(a) of the Penal Code.
• 29 May 2006 — The court sentenced the accused to 10 years’ imprisonment, commencing from the date of her arrest on 10 September 2005.

The offence

Guen Garlejo Aguilar and Jane Parangan La Puebla met in March 2005 at Orchard Road, became firm friends, and met regularly. On 7 September 2005, Jane visited the accused at the Sunglade apartment and an argument ensued that escalated into an exchange of blows.

During the struggle, the accused held the deceased’s neck tightly with her right hand, took a cushion with her left hand and smothered the deceased’s face, and after the deceased began to move both her hands, the accused used both hands and strangled the deceased until she stopped breathing.

After the killing, the accused placed the body inside a large “Santa Barbara Polo & Racquet Club” luggage bag to conceal it and cleaned up bloodstains in the Sunglade apartment. She also removed the deceased’s personal effects and the deceased’s work permit from the body. She hid the body in her room inside a luggage bag for two days.

On 9 September 2005, after her employers went to work, the accused bought items including a chopper and an axe, along with gloves, cleaning products, wallpaper, bedding items and black garbage bags. She returned to the Sunglade apartment after 9.30 a.m., dismembered the body, and placed the deceased’s head, arms and legs in separate plastic bags, then wrapped them in rubbish bags. She stuffed the body parts and newspapers into a travel bag, wrapped the torso in newspapers and a black rubbish bag, scrubbed blood traces with water and detergent, and covered stains with matching green wallpaper. She replaced bedding items and discarded items including gloves and the cushion used to smother the deceased.

Later that day, at about 12.35 p.m., she dumped the bag containing the deceased’s head and limbs next to the Orchard Road MRT station. At about 1.25 p.m., she put the bag with the torso into a bigger luggage bag, took a taxi to MacRitchie Reservoir, and left the smaller bag near the footpath along Lornie Road making no effort to conceal it. The suitcase contained an International Herald Tribune newspaper with a sticker bearing the label: “Mr Prakash Mallya #08-23 Sunglade 9 Serangoon Ave 2”.

The deceased was female aged 27 years. The accused also identified the deceased’s name as Jane Parangan La Puebla during proceedings.

Investigation

Police examined bags found at the scenes and conducted identification and follow-up steps.

At the Orchard Road MRT station scene, police arrived at about 1.53 p.m. and cordoned off the place. The bag was examined and found to contain pages from The Straits Times dated 8 September 2005 and two black garbage bags. Inside were more red plastic bags containing severed arms and legs. The torso was missing. A right thumbprint from one of the hands was obtained and upon screening was ascertained to be that of Jane Parangan La Puebla.

A check with the deceased’s employer revealed a missing person’s report made on 8 September 2005, which asserted she had been missing since 7 September 2005.

At MacRitchie Reservoir, police received a call about an unattended “World Polo” suitcase swarming with flies. The police unzipped the bag and found a torso crudely wrapped up in garbage bags, with head and limbs missing. The torso had feminine attributes and was clad in a brown bra and panties. The bag contained pages from the 6, 7 and 8 September issues of The Straits Times. It also contained a copy of International Herald Tribune with a label: “Mr Prakash Mallya #08-23 Sunglade 9 Serangoon Ave 2”.

Police proceeded to the apartment indicated by the label. The Sunglade apartment was occupied by Mr Prakash Mallya and his wife Anjali Mallya. Guen Garlejo Aguilar was the domestic assistant also present at the Sunglade apartment. Police interviewed the accused, who admitted knowing the deceased but denied any knowledge of her whereabouts.

A search of the accused’s room found blood stains on the underside of her mattress and on the floor below her bed. Police found sheared pieces of the deceased’s work permit and a “World Polo” card tag from the suitcase in a rubbish bin outside the accused’s room. Police also found an opened packet of red plastic bags, a chopper and an axe in a kitchen cabinet under the kitchen sink. The Mallyas confirmed that the chopper and the axe did not belong to them and had not been seen previously.

In the course of investigations, police identified the accused and had her in custody within about 12 hours.

Arrest

At about 12.40 a.m. on 10 September 2005, the accused was placed under arrest for the murder of the deceased.

Trial

Charges and plea

Before her trial began in May 2006, the charges against the accused were reduced to manslaughter, later proceeding on the charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder under s 304(a).

On 18 May 2006, the accused pleaded guilty to the following charge:

You, Guen Garlejo Aguilar (F/30 Years) FIN No: G 7383779 R are charged that you, on or about the 7th of September 2005, at or about 12.35 p.m., at Block 9 #08-23 Serangoon Avenue 2, Sunglade, Singapore, did cause the death of one Jane Parangan La Puebla, female aged 27 years, by strangling the said Jane Parangan La Puebla on the neck with both your hands, with the intention of causing her death, and you have thereby committed an offence of culpable homicide not amounting to murder punishable under section 304(a) of the Penal Code, Chapter 224.

Sentencing

The judge described three sentencing options for culpable homicide not amounting to murder under s 304(a) (excluding caning and/or a fine): life imprisonment, ten years’ imprisonment, or a term below ten years.

The court considered whether life imprisonment was appropriate using criteria summarized from earlier authorities, including the “Hodgson criteria” and related points on sentencing for indeterminate terms. The court also considered the accused’s psychiatric condition and risk of recidivism.

The accused was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment. The sentence commenced from the date of the accused’s arrest on 10 September 2005.

The judge, Justice V.K. Rajah, noted that the accused appeared to have recovered from depression compounded by financial woes, and that family support and counselling would “further diminish any risk of future offences”. The judge described the dismemberment as “grotesque and abominable” and said the accused’s behaviour in planting the deceased’s head and torso in very public places “strikes one as nothing short of incoherent and incomprehensible,” adding that it showed the workings of “a tortured mind”. The judge also referred to the need for an appropriate sentence given the accused’s conscious causing of the loss of a life.

Medical and psychiatric evidence

Accused’s injuries

On 10 September 2005 at 10.33 a.m., Dr Ian Jay Basiao Tan of Alexandra Hospital examined the accused and noted:

• (a) abrasions on the right shoulder, left leg, and nape; and
• (b) haematomas on the right forearm, left lower leg, left back and right forearm.

Deceased’s injuries and cause of death

An autopsy was performed by Dr Wee Keng Poh. Apart from marks sustained as a result of dismemberment, ante-mortem injuries were noted:

• (a) Head and neck – two large bruises, a haematoma with bruise, a laceration with surrounding bruise;
• (b) Left upper limb – a large bruise over the elbow;
• (c) Left lower limb – several bruises of varying sizes over the ankle, shin, knee and thigh;
• (d) Right upper limb – three superficial cuts extending as superficial linear abrasions roughly parallel to each other, a human bite mark with impressions of seven teeth over the mid-forearm;
• (e) Right lower limb – several bruises over the ankle, knee and shin, a cut on the knee and on the back of the heel, abrasions on the forefoot and leg.

Dr Wee filed a report on the cause of death on 6 December 2005. Based on DNA profiling of all the body parts and that the skin tone was the same, Dr Wee concluded that all body parts belonged to the deceased.

Dr Wee stated that toxicological analysis of blood and urine samples did not reveal any poisons. Due to the multitude of superficial ante-mortem external injuries, he concluded there was a struggle prior to the death. He declined to exclude the possibility of the deceased having been smothered and did not rule out death resulting from the altercation or from dismemberment. Dr Wee confirmed that the deceased sustained substantially more injuries over a greater area of her body compared with the accused.

Psychiatric assessment

The accused was remanded at Changi Women’s Prison for psychiatric assessment. Her assessor was Dr Tommy Tan, a consultant at the Institute for Mental Health. Dr Tan examined the accused and concluded she was suffering from masked depression, a moderate major depressive disorder (single episode), and that an abnormality of the mind caused by her mental disorder substantially impaired her mental responsibility at the time of the offence.

Dr Tan stated in his examination:

When I examined Guen, she was polite and cooperative. She was appropriate in her behaviour. However she was inappropriately cheerful when I examined her on 26/09/05. Although she appeared cheerful initially during the subsequent examinations, she became tearful with a depressed affect when she described about her relationship with the deceased, the money she had to borrow to help the deceased and about the alleged offence. [emphasis in original]

Dr Tan also recorded observations about the accused’s money problems:

Guen said that she began to feel very sad. She started having difficulty sleeping at night as she would be thinking. She slept more and ate more as she said that she would not have to think. She gained about 5 kg in weight in the recent months. She had difficulty concentrating on her work especially “when people called me regarding this matter”. She said that she felt worse each time the loan shark called her. She said that the loan shark had threatened to take away her work permit, go to her employer’s home and tell her employer. She said that she felt very stressed as this is [the] only problem she faced in Singapore. She said that she felt sad when she was asked for money. She said that she had not been sending money home for a few months because of this problem. Guen said that she could not tell her employers about her problem, as they have been good to her. She is very worried about what would happen to her children. While in remand, she said she woke up very early in the morning and slept in the daytime. She denied that she had suicidal thoughts.

Dr Tan testified as a prosecution witness and concluded there was a low risk of recidivism based on prognostic factors. Dr Tan identified a negative factor: the bizarre manner in which the body was disposed (dismemberment), while stating it probably related to the accused’s state of mind after rather than at the time of the offence.

Other details

Personal background

The accused was 30 years old at the time of mitigation, a citizen of the Philippines, living in the municipality of Tagudin, Ilocos Sur. In late 2001, she left her husband and two sons to seek employment in Singapore to supplement the family’s income.

At the hearing, information was presented about her relationship with the deceased as close friendship and about domestic strife and relationship difficulties with her husband, Edwin.

Details of the dispute and financial distress

The deceased solicited money from the accused, claiming she urgently needed to remit money back home. The accused repeatedly obliged and over time the deceased borrowed a total of $2,000 from or through the accused. Half came from the accused’s own savings. The remainder was procured through another Filipino friend, Jenny Narag (“Jenny”). Jenny borrowed the money on the accused’s behalf from a loan shark, and the accused had to pay monthly interest of 20%.

The accused became increasingly agitated about the overdue loan and felt intense pressure. The deceased adopted a cavalier attitude about settling her financial obligation, which severely distressed the accused and contributed to depression.

Employer involvement and items found

The Mallyas lived at the Sunglade apartment and confirmed the chopper and axe did not belong to them and had not been seen previously. Police found the label and newspaper inside the suitcase at MacRitchie Reservoir, leading police to the apartment.

Court personnel and observers

At sentencing, the accused’s husband and sister were in court along with Philippine embassy officials and the mayor of her hometown.

Judge’s remarks on sentence justification

The judge stated that:

Her illness did not in any way dispossess her of that ability to distinguish between right and wrong.

The judge also said:

Upon taking all the relevant circumstances, I determine that the appropriate sentence for the accused is a term of imprisonment of 10 years.

A lawyer for the accused also made remarks expressing relief:

"We are happy with the sentencing. Earlier there were some concerns that she might get a life sentence, so this is a huge relief for Guen," Aguilar's lawyer Sashi Nathan told reporters.

Legal citation and judgment identifiers

The case was cited as: Public Prosecutor v Aguilar Guen Garlejo [2006] 3 SLR 247; [2006] SGHC 94. The judgment was delivered in the sentencing context with V K Rajah J: 1 and dated 29 May 2006.