Beach Road chopper attack: Man jailed 19 years, caned for attempted murder of wife

CNA

03-06-2025

SINGAPORE: The man who hacked his wife with a chopper outside a Beach Road restaurant in 2022 was sentenced to 19 years in jail and eight strokes of the cane on Tuesday (Jun 3).
Cheng Guoyuan, 49, previously pleaded guilty to a single charge of attempted murder. This carries a maximum punishment of life imprisonment with caning.
Justice Audrey Lim also took into consideration two charges of intimidating bystanders with the chopper when sentencing him.
She agreed with the prosecution that Cheng's attack on his wife was premeditated and committed out of malice.
However, she found that it did not fall within the worst type of such cases, and hence did not warrant the maximum sentence.
Cheng, who followed proceedings through a Mandarin interpreter, kept his head bowed as the judge read out her decision.
Videos of the brutal attack on Apr 14, 2022 were circulated widely online. Multiple bystanders had tried to fend Cheng off by throwing things or holding him off with a ladder.
The victim, 44-year-old Han Hongli, suffered severe blood loss and took 1.5 years to recover and adjust to her life-threatening injuries.
These included deep lacerations across her body, open fractures and amputation of her ring finger.
She no longer has sight in her left eye, has a permanently disfigured face and her arms are permanently partially impaired.
Deputy Public Prosecutors Ng Jun Chong and Koh Yi Wen had urged the court to jail Cheng for life and impose eight to 12 strokes of the cane.
Cheng's lawyers Johannes Hadi and Wei Ziqiang, who were appointed pro bono, had argued for 15 years' jail and five strokes of the cane.
MOTIVATED BY VENGEANCE
Cheng was likely motivated by vengeance, according to his psychiatric assessment at the Institute of Mental Health.
Cheng and Ms Han, both Chinese nationals, were married in 2009. Ms Han has a daughter from a previous marriage and a son with Cheng.
Ms Han came to Singapore to work in 2016 and would remit money home. The couple's relationship became strained over time, and Cheng felt Ms Han looked down on him for earning less than her.
Sometime in April 2021, Ms Han discovered that Cheng had done something wrong to her daughter. The wrongdoing was not revealed in court.
When Ms Han confronted Cheng about it, he admitted to the wrongdoing but felt that it would not affect Ms Han's daughter. He also pleaded with his wife not to report it to the police and promised to compensate the daughter.
Ms Han eventually agreed for Cheng to pay the daughter 40,000 yuan (US$5,552) as compensation, but their relationship worsened. Cheng managed to borrow the money but subsequently fell into financial difficulty.
By then, Ms Han had stopped remitting money to Cheng, in part because she was not able to work due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Cheng "believed that his reputation and his family's reputation were more important than his life, and would rather die than 'losing (his) face'", prosecutors said.
He sought assurance from Ms Han that she would not tell his relatives and friends about his wrongdoing, and kept asking her to let the matter rest. He also asked her not to divorce him.
In September 2021, Cheng came to Singapore to work as a cleaner. Ms Han did not know he was in Singapore, and was shocked when he turned up at her workplace in November that year.
Later that month, Cheng threatened to kill Ms Han and not let her live in peace if she did not reconcile with him.
Ms Han reported these threats on Nov 28, 2021, and police investigated Cheng and warned him not to look for her.
Cheng returned to China in January 2022. In April that year, he found work at a restaurant and returned to Singapore, again without informing his wife.
ATTEMPTED MURDER
On Apr 12, 2022, Cheng "concluded that he might end up with nothing if the victim were to reveal the wrongdoing to anyone", said prosecutors.
"He was angry with the victim as she refused to forgive him for the wrongdoing even though he loved her and felt that she had done things which let him down," they said.
Cheng also hated that the victim "had control over his future".
To settle the matter, Cheng came up with a plan to kill his wife if she refused to confirm that she would not reveal the wrongdoing.
He went to the Beach Road restaurant where she worked, but returned to his dormitory when he could not find her.
The next day, he took a cleaver to the restaurant again and saw her from afar, but did not attack her.
On Apr 14, 2022, Cheng did not go to work. At about 5.20pm that day, he went to the restaurant where Ms Han worked.
She was shocked to see him, and asked him to go to a back lane where they could speak.
Based on Ms Han's attitude and responses, Cheng felt that she "could not be trusted to keep the wrongdoing a secret, and that she might reveal it to the Chinese police and his relatives", prosecutors said.
"He became very angry as he felt that she was not going to give him a chance even though he had already compensated their daughter for the wrongdoing," they added.
Pulling out the cleaver from his bag, he told her: "If I am not living well, you should not think about living."
He repeatedly slashed her with the chopper, chasing her when she tried to escape and pursuing her despite bystanders attempting to intervene.
Cheng was finally subdued after police arrived and fired a Taser at him.
He later admitted to attacking his wife out of anger. He knew it was wrong to try to kill her, but did not want her to risk exposing his wrongdoing.
According to a psychiatric assessment in 2022, Cheng would need to be closely monitored in prison, as he was at risk of developing an adjustment disorder due to his concerns about receiving a severe penalty.