Two men linked to bystander's death in Geylang fight get jail and caning
Rana Soheel (in white) arriving at the State Courts on Jul 11, 2017. (Photo: TODAY/Robin Choo)
SINGAPORE: Two men linked to a bystander's death after a 2017 brawl in Geylang were each given four years' jail and six strokes of the cane on Monday (Dec 28).
Bangladeshi nationals Rana Sohel, 38, and Mollah Hasan, 34, had been convicted after a trial of one charge each of voluntarily causing grievous hurt with common intention.
The incident occurred on the morning of Jul 9, 2017 at a restaurant in Lorong 24A.
Rana, Mollah and co-accused Reza Hasan were at the restaurant when another diner, Tan Wei Li, mistakenly thought that Rana's group was scolding his friends.
Tan confronted them, banging his hand on the table and spewing a Hokkien vulgarity.
The victim, 42-year-old Lim Leong Tat, was also at the restaurant and did not know either Tan or Rana's group of friends. He intervened and punched Rana while Tan and Rana were cursing at each other.
A fight broke out, with Reza pulling the victim towards the road before Rana and Mollah pursued the victim. They assaulted him repeatedly on the nape of his neck.
When the victim tried to escape, Rana pulled him by the hair and punched him repeatedly until he fell down. Mollah joined in and threw the victim against a roller shutter, before slamming him face down onto the concrete pavement.
After the assault, the victim managed to walk several metres to the back lane of Lorong 24A Geylang, where he was seen squatting.
This was likely a reflex action due to the lack of blood flowing to his heart as a result of his severe neck injury, said the prosecution.
The victim sat down by the side of the road and was later found dead in the alley.
An autopsy found blunt-force injuries to his neck, a partial dislocation of his upper neck vertebrae from his skull, as well as injury of the spinal cord and lower brain stem that led to cardiorespiratory failure.
The three accused men had denied the charges, saying they did not commit the acts, some of which were captured on closed-circuit television footage. Rana claimed that his attacks were in self-defence, but the prosecution slammed this as "unmeritorious".
Reza was sentenced in December to six months' jail for voluntarily causing hurt with common intention.
For voluntarily causing grievous hurt, Rana and Mollah could have been jailed for up to 10 years and fined or caned.
