A young man was sentenced to 16 years in prison by a judge in Singapore on Friday for killing a school friend with an ax, a crime that shocked the city-state in 2021.
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Singapore is known for having one of the lowest murder rates in the world – 0.2 per 100,000 people, according to UN data. The strict law enforcement laws punish vandalism with caning. Murder and drug trafficking carry the death penalty.
The young man, who was 16 at the time and cannot be identified for legal reasons, killed a 13-year-old River Valley High School classmate with an ax.
He pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to 16 years in prison.
The young man was suffering from depression at the time and committed a “carefully planned” murder as part of a plan to commit “suicide by police”, Judge Hoo Sheau Peng said. His goal was to kill multiple people, leaving law enforcement no choice but to shoot him, she said.
“It was a gratuitously violent murder, horrifying and incomprehensible due to its accidental nature,” the judge continued. “This caused great public concern.”
In response to a letter of apology from the murderer, the victim’s parents said they had forgiven him.