About six months after he was invited to live in a stranger's flat, Mohammad Rosli Abdul Rahim, 48, allegedly killed him.

Yesterday, Rosli was charged with the murder of Mr Mohammad Roslan Zaini, 35, who died after being stabbed between 1am and 4.33am on Wednesday at Block 165A Teck Whye Crescent.

Rosli had been sleeping in the rough for two years until Mr Roslan took pity on him and told him to move in.

As the charge was read out to him in Malay by an interpreter, Rosli wore a stern expression as he stood in the dock.

According to earlier news reports, the victim was stabbed in the chest and found lying motionless at around 4.40am on a grass patch at the foot of his block. Paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene.

A trail of blood led from the corridor outside his one-room rental unit on the fourth storey and down a staircase to where he collapsed.

Next-door neighbour Frankie Tan, 49, told The Straits Times in an earlier interview that Rosli had been sleeping on the third-storey staircase landing of the block for two years before Mr Roslan invited him to move into his flat. The warehouse assistant added: "The victim said he pitied him."

Another neighbour, who works in the logistics sector, described Mr Roslan as a divorcee whose former wife and baby son used to live in the unit with him.

Mr Roslan's girlfriend of three months was at the scene of the murder about seven hours after he was pronounced dead.

She knew of the incident only after a friend alerted her. She said the friend told her to rush down because Mr Roslan was unconscious.

Rosli has been remanded at the Central Police Division and will be back in court next Friday. If convicted of murder, he faces the death penalty.