A 31-year-old man who hijacked a taxi at Changi Airport's budget terminal and ran over a cleaning supervisor was sentenced to 25 months in jail on Monday.

China national Yuan Zhenghua was also disqualified from driving all classes of vehicles for eight years. He pleaded guilty to all five charges including dangerous driving, theft of motor vehicle and driving without a licence.

In March last year, Yuan careened into the Budget Terminal departure hall and hit Mr Chandra Mogan Panjanathan, 34, who was operating a floor-scrubbing machine. The Malaysian father of four, who was at the end of his shift, died instantly.

In mitigation, Mr Anand Nalachandran, one of three lawyers who represented Yuan on a pro bono basis, said that at the time of the incident, he suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, and that he was delusional. The former technician has been remanded since a day after the incident last year.