4 deaths in Geylang fire: Jail, fine for men who used apartment as illegal workers’ dormitory
The aftermath of a fire that broke out at Lorong 4 Geylang which killed four people.
SINGAPORE — A landlord and two of his tenants put up partitions in a private residential apartment in order to house 22 foreign workers, converting the original five rooms into 10.
Tragedy then struck in the early hours of Dec 6 in 2014, when an electrical fire gutted the ground floor of the three-storey Geylang shophouse, killing four Malaysian workers. They had been staying in one of the rooms and died of smoke inhalation.
On Monday (Feb 18), the apartment owner, 61-year-old Chiang Teck Fung, was sentenced to 10 months’ jail and a S$50,000 fine.
One of his tenants, Ong Kah Sim, 68, and another tenant, Khah Tee Meng, 55, were each jailed 13 months and fined S$60,000.
All three were found guilty after an eight-day trial in the State Courts. They were convicted on one charge each under the Fire Safety Act and one charge each under the Planning Act.
They will begin serving their sentences on March 4 after requesting a deferment, and are each out on S$15,000 bail.
BYPASSED THE AUTHORITIES
Court documents showed that in 2007, Ong began renting the apartment along Geylang Lorong 4 from Chiang. Ong would then sublet it to other tenants, mainly foreign workers.
Chiang was aware of this arrangement and the lease was renewed several times until May 2014.
Over these seven years or so, Chiang increased the monthly rent from S$600 to S$1,500.
Ong then asked to partition more rooms in the apartment to sustain his business and Chiang agreed. Ong increased the number of rooms from five to nine.
However, they did not apply to get an approval from the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) to put up the partitions. They also did not get an approval from the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) to change the use of the apartment to that of a workers’ dormitory housing more than eight workers.
At the time, URA’s occupancy cap for private residential properties was eight unrelated occupants. This was changed to six occupants from May 2017.
In early 2014, the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) raided the place and found two overstayers. Chiang then terminated Ong’s lease, demanding he tear down the partitions as the ICA would be conducting another check.
Ong hired Khah to do so, who reinstated the apartment to its original condition sometime in July 2014.
However, the next month, Chiang and Khah signed a two-year tenancy agreement. Khah rented the apartment for S$2,500 monthly — more than four times the original rent.
Khah and Ong made an arrangement between them as well, where Ong would finance the costs of renting the apartment and renovation works, and source for tenants. Khah would do the housekeeping and receive a share of the profits.
During this time, Khah followed Ong’s previous layout and put up partitions again. Besides that, he created another room, bringing the total number of rooms to 10.
On Dec 6 in 2014, a fire broke out in the apartment, claiming the lives of four workers. Five other people staying there and two firefighters were also injured.
The SCDF later established that the fire started “at the electrical source at the fluorescent lighting” outside one of the rooms.
Investigations revealed that 22 foreign workers — who came from countries including Bangladesh, China and Malaysia — and two Singaporeans were staying there. The two Singaporeans occupied one room each.
Last year, three employers who housed their workers in the apartment were fined a total of S$153,000 and barred from hiring foreign workers. They were Ong Lai Kar, director of Essential Clean and Care; Ong Huay Chew, director of Seng Foo Building Construction; and Koh Kok Seng, director of Bestway Cleaning Services.
SOLE MOTIVE WAS TO ‘MAXIMISE PROFIT’
The prosecution argued that even though the partitions did not directly cause the workers’ death, they “clearly contributed to it”.
Deputy Public Prosecutors Wong Kok Weng, Soh Weiqi and Jane Lim said: “The partitions erected narrowed the common corridor significantly and affected the means of escape and the effectiveness of fire-fighting efforts. Further, because the partitions were made of combustible material, they added fuel to the fire and also contributed to the build-up of smoke in the premises.”
They highlighted that this was the first case of its kind where deaths had occurred in an illegal foreign workers’ dormitory. The three men’s “sole intention was to maximise profit” by creating more rooms to accommodate more foreign workers, they added.
