Prosecution's case On 11 May 1970, the murder trial for Ong Beang Leck's killing took place at the
High Court. Due to the abolition of jury trials in January of that same year, the trial was presided by two judges Justice
A V Winslow and Justice
D C D'Cotta. The three defendants - Lee Chor Pet, Lim Kim Kwee and Ho Kee Fatt - pleaded not guilty to the murder charge, which was brought forward by the trial prosecutor
K. S. Rajah. Should the men be found guilty of murder under Section 302 of the
Penal Code, the
death penalty was
mandatory upon conviction, and under the Kidnapping Act, the men's second charge of kidnapping which was punishable by death or
life imprisonment with
caning, although this other charge was fully withdrawn in midst of the proceedings. Chanda Singh, the forensic pathologist, was summoned to court to present his forensic report. A skeleton model was borrowed from a hospital to use as a demonstration on how Ong was killed, with Ong's shirt being put on. Singh told the court that according to the holes and torn areas on the shirt, it was deduced that the fatal blows were delivered from behind, and that the attack occurred from behind, and it was likely that a screwdriver was used to stab Ong. Out of the multiple wounds, one of them penetrated the ribs and another penetrated the pelvic bone, which also cut through the bladder and intestines. The second injury put forward by Singh was sufficient in the ordinary cause of nature to result in death if left unattended. Singh concluded that the cause of Ong's death was due to haemorrhage and shock due to multiple wounds. Richard Lai, who was still serving his four-year sentence, came to court as the prosecution's key witness. Lai, who acted as the driver, testified that he only took part in the plan due to his need for money to discharge the huge financial debts incurred from his electrical firm business. Lai recounted that on the night of the murder, while he was driving the car along a secluded spot in
Clementi, with Ong sitting next to him and the three murder accused sitting in the back, the trio suddenly took out a screwdriver, hammer and other tools to assault Ong from behind before they brutally murdered him. Lai, who was unaware of the presence of weapons, stated he was shocked at the violence and thought that their only plan was to kidnap rather than killing Ong. He stated that he was told to drive to a manhole in Jurong, where the trio abandoned the body. Richard was identified to be the one who negotiated the ransom with the Ong family through phone calls. To the shock of Lee, his mother Goh Sui Hong and youngest brother Lee Chor Hock appeared as prosecution witnesses. Goh, who took the stand first, stated that she was asked to keep a large amount of money, which Lee passed to his brother Chor Hock for safekeeping. Goh also told the court that Lee, her eldest out of three sons, went to visit her in her house at
Kulai and confessed that the money was a ransom obtained from the killing of his colleague, and he stated that he was forced to keep the money. Chor Hock also told the court that on that night, he saw his brother, Lim, Ho and Richard Lai cleaning the rented car (in which Ong was killed earlier) and Lai telling him to wash a bloodstained floormat from the car. Chor Hock also testified he saw the five conspirators of Ong's kidnapping carrying a bag of money (which was the ransom paid by Ong's father), which they divide between themselves.
Defences of the trio Lee Chor Pet first took the stand. He denied that he killed Ong, and stated that the plan was only to kidnap Ong, knock him unconscious inside the car and confine him for a few days. However, inside the car, according to Lee's account, things went terribly wrong as Ho brandished the weapons and violently attacked Ong, stabbing him despite Lee's efforts to restrain Ho, who even slashed Lee's leg in retaliation, before he and the others chased after Ong, who escaped the car, and assaulted the youth to death. By Lee's insistence, the murder of Ong itself was not part of their pre-arranged plan to kidnap Ong. Under the questioning of the judge, Lee agreed that they indeed extorted the ransom of S$20,000 and later divided it into shares of less than S$4,000 for each of the five kidnappers. Lim Kim Kwee was the next to give his defence. He claimed that his statements to the police were fabricated by the investigating officer Ong Hean Teik, and therefore put up an alibi defence, stating that he was working overtime at his workplace, an engineering firm. Although Lim's foreman and colleague were called to support his defence, they were however, unable to confirm Rajah's questions if they indeed saw Lim working overtime on the same night that fateful day when Ong was murdered. Ho Kee Fatt, who took the stand last, put the blame entirely on Lee, claiming that Lee was the one who prepared all the weapons and brought them into the car, and claimed that on the night itself, Lee was the only person who used the weapons to viciously attack Ong while he himself did not lay a hand on Ong, and the murder itself was out of the scope of their kidnap plot.
Murder trial verdict On 12 June 1970, Justice A V Winslow and Justice D C D'Cotta delivered their verdict. Justice Winslow, who pronounced the verdict in court, stated that they accepted the testimony of Richard Lai, considering him as a truthful witness despite their caution to accept his sole word against the three accused and the "despicable" conduct of Lai for having abetted the kidnapping and ransom negotiation. On the totality of evidence, the judges rejected Lee's "untruthful" account, Lim's alibi defence and Ho's claims of Lee being the sole person responsible for the killing, and they further determined that the trio were responsible for the ruthless and premeditated murder of Ong, who was unfortunate to be a target for kidnapping due to his family's affluent background. Therefore, the three murderers - Lee Chor Pet, Lim Kim Kwee and Ho Kee Fatt - were found
guilty of murder and
sentenced to death by
hanging. The trial itself was the first case where two judges presided the trial hearing of a capital case and sent three men to the gallows for murder, after the
Singapore government abolished jury trials for capital crimes in January 1970, five months before the verdict of death was given. ==Appeal processes==