On this episode of Singapore Unsolved Mystery, we cover the horrifying massacre of the
Tan children. In 1979, Mr Tan Kuen Chai and his wife Lee Mei Ying lived in a one-room
apartment in Gelyang Bahru together with their four children ten-year-old Tan Kok
Peng eight-year-old Tan Kok Hin six-year-old Tan Kok Soon and the only daughter was five-year-old
Tan Chin Nee. The couple operated a mini bus service that transported students to school.
So, in 6th January 1979, at 6:35 am the couple left for work while their children were asleep at that
time. At 7:10 am their mother phoned them three times to wake them up but received no answer. She
proceeded to ask a neighbour to help wake the children up. The neighbour knocked on the door
but received no replies. After 10 am the couple returned home and Lee found the bodies of her
children in the bathroom. The children's bodies were dressed in their T-shirts and underwear
and were left piled on each other with slash wounds on their head. The children had at least
20 slash wounds each. The right arm of Kok Peng the oldest child was almost severed while Chin Nee
the youngest child had slash wounds on her face. Now, this investigation was later conducted by
the Special Investigation Section of the Criminal Investigation Department. The police were unable to
identify a motive but inferred that the murders were motivated by vengeance. The killer was careful not
to leave any evidence behind. As blood stains were found in a kitchen sink, the killers or killer
appeared to have cleaned himself or themselves before leaving. And there was no evidence of forced
entry and the flat has not been ransacked and no items were reported missing. The murder weapons,
believed to be a cleaver or a dagger were never found. And the eldest son Kok Peng was believed to
have put out a fight with the killer as several strands of long hair were found in his right hand.
So question, if he has the long hair on his hand right then how come they cannot find the murderer?
DNA was invented in 1986 and then this was in the 1970s so like probably they do not have any
database (or technology) at that point in time to conduct any DNA testing. Now, the police interviewed over
100 of Mr Tan family's neighbour and made public appeals for witnesses but to no avail.
Two weeks after the murders, the couple received a Chinese New Year greeting card, depicting happy
children playing with the words: "Now you can have no more offsprings hahaha." All this is written in
Chinese and signing off as the murderer. As the sender addressed the parents by their personal
nicknames "Ah Chai" and "Ah Eng", police believed that the killer is someone with close relations
to the Tan family. Till this day, no one has been convicted and the murderer was never caught.
With that, let's talk about some possible theories. Theory number one,
illegal tontine scheme. The children's uncle told the press that the murders could have
been related to an illegal tontine scheme and the killer was possibly a discontented gambler.
However, the couple told the media that they have not offended anyone.
And as you know, no murderer was ever found, this is just a speculation with no evidence.
Theory number two, killed by their neighbour. A taxi driver reported that on that day of the murder,
a man in his 20s boarded his taxi near the Tan's home at about 8 am. This man, a Malaysian man
had blood stains on his left side of the body and carried a knife. The children's father matched the
taxi driver's description to one of their neighbours. In the police lineup, the taxi
driver picked out the same neighbour as the man who has boarded his taxi. However, the neighbour
was released after two weeks due to the lack of evidence connecting him to the murders. So what
do you think? Do you think a discontented gambler murdered the Tan children? Or do you think it was
done by their neighbour? Our heart goes out to the victims and their family and we do hope that
more information will be revealed in the future. But for now, this case remains unsolved.
We hope that this video has brought awareness, that low crime does not mean no crime.
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Comment down below what unsolved mystery do you want us to cover next.
Would you leave your kids at home alone? Actually I don't know, would you?