Singapore jails man for setting fire to neighbour’s flat over Chinese prayer altar dispute

Patrick Francis was jailed for 13 days after pleading guilty to one charge of mischief by setting fire to his neighbour’s main door last year

He was angry with the nearby resident for confronting his mother who changed the lock on the prayer altar that belonged to the victim

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The arson attack happened at a public housing block in Singapore. File photo: AFP

Published: 4:15pm, 10 Aug 2023

A man in Singapore was jailed for 13 days on Thursday for setting fire to a neighbour’s flat after a dispute over a prayer altar.

Patrick Francis, also known as Pandian, pleaded guilty to one charge of mischief by setting fire to his neighbour’s main door past midnight on May 8, 2022.

The court heard that the accused’s family knew the victim’s family for about six years before the incident. The accused’s mother lived in a unit on the first floor of a Housing Board block at Lorong 5 Toa Payoh, while the victim lived on the third floor with his girlfriend.

A few years before the incident in 2022, the victim’s girlfriend, 50-year-old Tang Yee Peng, requested for a small space at Francis’ mother’s unit on the first floor.

Tang wanted this space to accommodate a Chinese prayer altar. Francis’ family agreed to give her this space.

This agreement continued until Tang had to return to Malaysia when the Covid-19 pandemic struck in 2020.