‘Why did this happen?’: Parents of man jailed for murdering sister speak of the brother he once was
Parents of Huang Bocan and his sister Huang Baoying say they regret focusing too much on work and wish they had spent more time with their children.
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SINGAPORE: When Huang Baoying was growing up, her older brother helped look after her, their parents recalled.
Huang Bocan would tutor his younger sister at night and help her with her studies, their mother said.
To his parents, he was a responsible son whom they trusted to help care for Baoying while they worked long hours.
Years later, he would be sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering her.
“We never imagined that things could become so serious,” their father said after Bocan, 34, was sentenced on Thursday (Nov 5).
Speaking to reporters in Mandarin outside the High Court, his mother said that besides helping Baoying with tuition and her studies, Bocan also did well in school himself.
"We felt like Bocan was relatively mature and grown-up, and since we were working, (we) let Bocan look after his sister," she said.
The couple, who said they are factory workers, did not want to give their names.
She recalled how Bocan, still a young boy, would accompany their nanny to bring his baby sister home, helping care for her when she was not even a year old.
“Actually, he was very kind-hearted,” she said, recalling how he would do volunteer work, including overseas such as in Chiang Mai, Thailand, where he helped to build toilets.
“Why did this happen?”
Bocan, who joined his girlfriend Chee Mei Wan, 47, and another man in starving his then 19-year-old sister and chaining her to a toilet, was first charged in 2021 with common intention of committing murder by causing bodily injury.
The 34-year-old Singaporean was convicted on Thursday of committing murder by causing his younger sister's death.
The prolonged abuse resulted in the death of Baoying, who had lost 43 per cent of her body weight by the time she died from excessive blunt force trauma and severe malnourishment on May 5, 2021.
His co-accused are Lim Peng Tiong, 67 and Chee. Chee was the "coach" of a company that marketed and sold Herbalife products, where Bocan, Lim and Baoying were members and "trainee coaches".
Lim was sentenced to 14 years and 11 months’ jail in May, while Chee's case is pending before the courts.
One of Bocan's lawyers, Mr Nathan Shashidran, told the court on Thursday that Bocan's father had contacted him almost every day, and that Baoying's death had "broken up the family in many ways".
Bocan's parents, who were seated in the front row of the public gallery throughout the almost three-hour hearing, asked through their lawyers to speak to their son after he was sentenced.
They walked over to their son, who was separated by a glass barrier, and spoke to him for close to 10 minutes.
As they parted, Bocan’s mother appeared visibly distressed. His father remained composed, pausing before he left to thank the defence lawyers, bowing to Mr Nathan.
Asked what Bocan told them, his mother said: “He didn't say much. He told us to take care of ourselves since we are both older already.”
In turn, his father told Bocan he hopes that while his son is in jail, he will try his best to do good deeds and help people.
The siblings' parents, both in their late 50s, had emigrated from China to Singapore in the 1990s.
Bocan's mother said her son was very brave, travelling on a plane by himself when he was 10 years old to join his parents in Singapore.
Those early years were not easy and they felt anxious, said the parents, with the family living in a rented room.
With both parents busy at work, they relied on Bocan to look after his sister.
“He had always looked after his younger sister as she grew up. He would help tutor her, even though the circumstances were very difficult,” said their mother.
She also described Bocan as a “very mature person, someone with a mind of his own”.
Bocan's father said that, growing up, his son was always a "sensible" boy.
“If he took the wrong bus, he would just have to take another one and try again,” he added.
When he first arrived in Singapore, he struggled with English. But he later excelled in school, getting a 3.9 grade point average at Ngee Ann Polytechnic and a scholarship to study engineering at university.
Bocan and his younger sister became involved with Chee through her company, Colourful Nutrifit, in 2018, bonding over their shared interest in Herbalife products and taking part in weight-loss challenges.
After the company closed its storefront in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, the group began meeting at the siblings' family home, where Bocan helped Chee promote her products online.
The siblings later fell out with their father over their spending on the products and moved into Lim's home in July 2020, with Chee joining them after a dispute with her husband.
Their parents could not contact them directly for over a year.
"After they left, we kept trying to get in touch with them, but we couldn't reach them directly," said Bocan's father.
Looking back, the siblings' parents said they regretted spending too much time working and wished they had spent more time with their children and "put their family first".
“I think many families may neglect their children. We spent far too little time accompanying them,” said the father.
“Everyone has to work, but we still have to take care of our own families.”
His wife added: “We really should have put family first, because we were only focused on working.”
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