Singapore hangs ex-police officer convicted of Kovan double murder

SINGAPORE: A former policeman who was convicted over the murder of two people in 2013 was executed on Wednesday (Feb 5).

The police said the capital punishment was carried out against Iskandar Rahmat, after his petitions to Singapore’s president for clemency were unsuccessful.

Iskandar, a 46-year-old Singaporean, had been on death row since 2017. He was found guilty of the murder of two men – a car workshop owner and his son – and sentenced to death on Dec 4, 2015.

The Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal against his conviction and sentence on Feb 3, 2017, the police said.

Capital punishment is imposed only for the most serious crimes, including murder, they added.

WHAT ISKANDAR DID

Iskandar, a 14-year veteran of the police force, had killed a car workshop owner and the man’s son on Jul 10, 2013.

Passers-by watched in horror as Iskandar, while fleeing in a Toyota Camry along Upper Serangoon Road, dragged Mr Tan Chee Heong, then 42, under the car.

The bloody trail led back to a house on Hillside Drive — about 1km away — where the body of his father, Mr Tan Boon Sin, 67, lay with multiple stab wounds.

After a 54-hour manhunt, Iskandar was arrested in Johor Bahru, Malaysia.

He had earlier hatched a plan to rob the older Tan of money kept in a safe deposit box at Certis Cisco, in order to avert a possible sacking over his “financial embarrassment”.

He carried out his scheme a day before a deadline to make a S$50,000 (US$36,972) lump-sum payment to clear his S$65,000 bank debt.

In convicting Iskandar in 2015, the High Court rejected his defence that he had intended to rob and run, but was forced to defend himself against a knife-wielding Tan Boon Sin and that the older man died from his injuries during the scuffle.