TWO Hongkong people caught smuggling heroin into Singapore remain on death row after their appeals were rejected by the Court of Criminal Appeal yesterday.
Waiter Nathan Tse Po-chung, 30, and saleswoman Cheuk Mei-mei, 27, were caught with more than four kilograms of heroin at the Changi Airport transit lounge on February 28, 1989. They were sentenced to death by the High Court more than a year ago.
The appeal judges yesterday rejected the argument that even though goods were brought within port limits, they could not be said to be ''imported'' into the country if the goods were in transit.
The appeal judges noted that Tse and Cheuk hid the heroin in their shoes and under their clothes, bringing it from Phuket in Thailand to Singapore to board a flight to Amsterdam that night.
Their defence at their four-day trial early last year was that they neither knew what they were carrying was heroin, nor did they intend to import it into Singapore.
The trial judges rejected as unbelievable both Tse's and Cheuk's defences that they did not know they were carrying heroin.