The Ang Mo Kio Case

Acting on information, police enter an apartment in Ang Mo Kio (North-Eastern part of Singapore)
at 4 a.m. They find the dead body of an adult female on the floor of the front room. There are no
signs of disturbances in the other rooms. Inspection reveals severe bruising and lacerations to the
head and abdomen. The rectal body temperature is found to be 33 C (91 F). You may take
normal body temperature as 37 C (99 F). The air-conditioner is found to be switched off and the
temperature in the room is 25 C (77 F). The arms, but not the legs, are stiff. The window is
broken, but there is hardly any broken glass on the floor.
Enquiries yield the following information:
Witness 1 reports hearing a disturbance in the apartment at 10 p.m. Witness 2 reports that the
resident of the apartment was on bad terms with the landlords, Mr. and Mrs. A, and their two
sons. Witness 3 reports seeing the sons of Mr. and Mrs. A in Jurong Point (a shopping mall in the
Western part of Singapore) at 10:20 p.m.
Scrapings from under the deceased fingernails provided materials for DNA analysis. The STR gel
electrophoresis of this material and some suspects are shown in Figure 1. Diagrams showing
blood spatter patterns in the room are shown in Figures 2 to 4.

a. What marks would you expect to find on the attacker? Explain your answer.
Scratches may be found on the face or the arms of the attacker, due to resistance of the
victim (fingernail scrapings). Also attacker could have cuts from the broken glass.
Attackers clothes should also contain victims blood, because of the intesity of the strikes.
b. What additional evidence might be found on the door handle? Explain your answer.
There might be found attacker's fingerprints on the door handle (as well as the victim's,
but that is normal) and possibly attackers blood if he touched his wound(s).
c. Where is a likely place that you would find the weapon? Explain your answer.
I concluded the weapon is blunt object, due to blood spatter and type of
injuries on the victim. A smaller object (bat, hammer) could be tossed out
through the broken window (because of the relatively small hole in the
window), and if it was larger, object can be taken throughout either of the
doors or the second window since the blood drops are found in the
direction of both doors and second window. As for example of a larger
object I can think of some kind of a chair (no chairs for the second person
to sit is kind of strange). Also injuries on the head and the abdomen region
can be made at the same time by some kind of a chair, so it is a thing to
think about.
d. Considering all of the evidence presented, which part(s) do you consider to be unreliable?
Explain your answer.
I think witness 3 can be unreliable. In my opinion it is hard to track time when you just see
someone, as opposite to witness 1 who heard a disturbance and is, in a way, confirmed
by the Algor mortis (5-7 hours) and by the Rigor mortis (4-8 hours). Of course determining
the time of death is also unreliable and attacker could be in the mall at that time. Time
estimated to come from Ang Mo Kio to Jurong Point (by google maps) is cca 25 minutes,
(of normal driving so the attacker could speed up and be there in time) meaning a 5
minute error done by the either of witnesses can mean a lot.

e. Using the figures provided, carry out a sequential reconstruction of the events that may
have occurred in the apartment in as much detail as possible. Give the evidence for each
event.
I can't really question reasons why the victim let the attacker in to the apartment, but since
there are no evidences of breaking in, victim most likely knew the attacker. The spilled
coffee also shows that. Around 10pm (according to the witness 1 and presumable time of
death) there comes to a struggle and victim scratches the attackker (most likely face or
arms). Attacker hits victim with a blunt object while she was still standing (because of the
blood drops that are aproximately in the head level). After a few strikes victim tries to run
away or call for help from the window. She didn't make it and probably slamed or was
slamed in the window (window is broken from the inside because almost no glass was
found). Victim then ends up on the floor where attacker beats her to death, which is visible
from blood stains that are lower than the stains from the other wall. He then disposes the
murder weapon like presumed in the question c. In the search for alibi probably hurries to

f.

the mall.
Who is the prime suspect, if any? Give your evidence using Figure 1.
Younger son is the prime suspect. Through analysis of the DNA found we can conlude
that the suspect is the child of Mr. and Mrs. A, but not the older because there are
differences in DNA found and his DNA.