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ON TRIAL: Eu Lim Hoklai said Madam Yu Hongjin tried to blackmail him after he attempted to end their relationship. -- PHOTO: SHIN MIN
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A SEAFOOD stall boss yesterday admitted to strangling his China lover, but said he only meant to make her pass out so he could escape.
Eu Lim Hoklai, 54, told the High Court during his first day on the stand that Madam Yu Hongjin had stabbed him after he refused to pay her $30,000 for breaking up with her.
He said that he had seen a man leaving her flat in Ang Mo Kio on June 14, 2006. When he asked her to stop seeing the man, she told him not to interfere with her freedom.
When he first met her back in March 2005, she had a massage parlour in Serangoon and was a single mum to a young boy.
He claimed that he paid for her trips to China and spent an estimated $20,000 on her; when she moved her massage parlour to Ang Mo Kio, he sank $8,500 into her business.
He said he also paid her rent but she had never allowed him into her flat. They had had sex about four times in hotels from March or April 2005 to June 2006.
When things soured between them, he said that she had threatened to create trouble with his family unless he compensated her with money.
They argued almost daily and when he went to see her on June 18, 2006, which was Father's Day, she slapped him.
He said that when he tried to leave, she stabbed him.
She could have been stabbed during the struggle that ensued, he added.
He then throttled her till she lay still, after which, he said, he passed out.
When the police arrived, she was dead on a massage bed, knife in hand.
Eu told his lawyer Subhas Anandan that his cellphone rang during the struggle. It was one of his two daughters reminding him about the Father's Day lunch they were supposed to have.
Keeping Madam Yu at bay with one hand, he urged his daughter to get help.
As Eu had given a different version of the story in his police statements, Justice Kan Ting Chiu asked for telephone records.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Winston Cheng, cross-examining Eu, listed the discrepancies between his testimony and his police statements.
Eu, whose IQ is below average, said that the statements had been taken two years ago and details were hazy.
Today, a replica of a cubicle in Madam Yu's massage parlour will be set up in the courtroom so that he can explain exactly how she died.
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