Singapore woman who fatally abused Myanmar domestic worker pleads guilty, faces life
- CCTV footage showed how Gaiyathiri Murugayan repeatedly abused and starved Myanmar national Piang Ngaih Don for nine months until her death
- The prosecution described her actions as ‘heinous’ and ‘inhumane’. She pleaded guilty to 28 charges including culpable homicide, and faces 87 more
This proved to be her undoing, with the cameras capturing her repeatedly abusing Piang Ngaih Don, a 24-year-old Myanmar national, over nine months. Piang was deprived of food and water, losing 15kg in the process. She weighed just 24kg when she died in July 2016.
Gaiyathiri, 40, pleaded guilty to 28 charges in the High Court on Tuesday. These included culpable homicide not amounting to murder, wrongful restraint and causing hurt or grievous hurt to Piang. Justice See Kee Oon will consider another 87 similar charges for sentencing at a later date.
The prosecution, led by Deputy Chief Prosecutor Mohamed Faizal Mohamed Abdul Kadir, argued that the case was “especially heinous and especially horrific” enough to warrant life imprisonment.
“This is a case where, simply put, words fail us. That one human being would treat another in this evil and utterly inhumane manner is cause for the righteous anger of the court,” it added.
Gaiyathiri had rained blows on the worker and Gaiyathiri’s mother Prema S Naraynasamy allegedly punched the worker’s neck and choked her. They tied her hands to a window grille as they occasionally did, leaving her in the bedroom.