‘Love gone wrong’: Woman who fatally stabbed boyfriend in Ang Mo Kio gets life for murder

A 43-year-old woman who fatally stabbed her boyfriend after suspecting that he had been drinking with a beer promoter was sentenced on Oct 7 to life imprisonment for murder, in what a High Court judge called a “tragic case of love gone wrong”.

Nguyen Ngoc Giau, a Vietnamese national and Singapore permanent resident, stabbed Mr Cho Wang Keung, 51, in the common corridor outside his fifth-floor Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3 flat shortly before 1am on July 15, 2021.

When police officers arrived at the scene, they found her sitting in the corridor with Mr Cho sprawled on her.

Both had multiple stab wounds. They were taken to the hospital separately and Mr Cho was pronounced dead at about 7.15am that day.

In a murder trial that began in April, the defence contended that Giau was too intoxicated at the time to have intended to fatally stab Mr Cho, and that his death was the result of a sudden fight between the couple.

These defences were rejected by Justice Dedar Singh Gill.

The judge sentenced Giau to imprisonment for life after the prosecution said it was not seeking the death sentence for her.

After the verdict, the slim-built woman asked the judge through an interpreter if she could appeal. He replied that she could discuss it with her lawyer.

In a written judgment explaining his decision to convict her of murder, the judge said: “While I acknowledge that the accused was intoxicated at the material time, her intoxication was not so severe as to prevent her from forming the intention to inflict the fatal wounds.

“The evidence instead portrays someone who remained capable of forming specific intentions and acting upon them in a rational and calculated manner.”

The judge added that the sudden-fight contention rested “largely on speculation and attempts to draw multiple successive inferences from circumstantial evidence”.

Crucially, Giau herself never mentioned in any of her statements to the police that a fight broke out between them, he said.

Justice Gill noted that the relationship between Giau and Mr Cho was fraught with frequent quarrels and fights.

“In this mix entered a female beer promoter. This ignited suspicion and anger. A life has been needlessly lost,” he said.

Giau had moved into Mr Cho’s flat in July 2020 as a tenant, and initially slept in the living room.

But by October that year, she was sharing a bedroom with Mr Cho, a jewellery assembler.

Another tenant, Mr Tan Cheng Mun, occupied another bedroom.

The fatal stabbing followed a dispute that arose after Mr Cho had some friends over at the flat for drinks after dinner on July 12, 2021.

The prosecution’s case

The prosecution contended that Giau became upset with one of the friends, a female beer promoter whom she had previously seen sitting on Mr Cho’s lap.

She locked Mr Cho out of their bedroom the following night.

On July 14, 2021, she tried to call him more than 30 times throughout the day.

At about 8.55pm, she texted him “446 good”, referring to the coffee shop where the beer promoter worked because she suspected Mr Cho had gone there to drink with the woman.

Her calls and messages went unanswered.

When Mr Cho and Mr Tan returned to the flat past midnight, on July 15, 2021, they were confronted by Giau in the common corridor.

She questioned Mr Cho about where he had gone to drink and recorded a video of the confrontation on her mobile phone.

When he ignored her and tried to move away, she grabbed his shirt collar and pulled him back.

Mr Cho then asked Mr Tan to call the police.

While the call was being made, Giau told Mr Cho not to “be overboard as a person” before returning to the flat and ending the recording.

She took a knife she had sharpened earlier that day and stabbed Mr Cho several times in the common corridor.

When she saw Mr Tan taking photos of the assault, she turned her attention to him and he fled down the stairs.

The prosecution also contended that Giau subsequently stabbed herself.

The defence’s case

The defence contended that this was an unfortunate case of a couple in an “unhealthy relationship plagued by quarrels and fights”.

Giau said she began drinking in the morning on July 14, 2021.

Throughout the day, she consumed beer while making six audio recordings in which she appeared to be crying and speaking about having been beaten up.

At about 9pm, she bought more beer from a minimart and continued drinking.

Shortly before her confrontation with Mr Cho, she could be heard giggling as she filmed an upside-down video on her phone of her walking in and out of the flat.

The final footage from the doorbell camera outside the flat captured her repeatedly shouting “I love you”.

In his judgment, Justice Gill said her actions demonstrated “a clear chain of purposeful decision-making”.

He said Giau was angry with Mr Cho over his interactions with the beer promoter even before he returned home on July 15, 2021.

Her anger intensified upon seeing the two men returning home together, and she became even more upset when Mr Cho refused to tell her where he had been and instead asked Mr Tan to call the police.

The judge noted that she deliberately retrieved a knife which she knew was sharp to attack Mr Cho.

“This level of strategic thinking illustrates that she could form the requisite intention notwithstanding her intoxicated state,” he said.

He added that based on the video evidence, she demonstrated clear physical coordination and cognitive awareness throughout the incident.

Source: The Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.

Public Prosecutor v Nguyen Ngoc Giau [2025] SGHC 197

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