2022 Ang Mo Kio flat stabbing

On 11 January 2022, 30-year-old Isabel Elizabeth Francis, who was 15 weeks pregnant with a daughter, was stabbed to death by her 33-year-old husband, David Brian Chow Kwok-Hun (Chinese: 周国坤; pinyin: Zhōu Guókūn), inside their Ang Mo Kio flat. Chow, who was arrested and indicted for murder, was said to have misunderstood that his company would go bankrupt due to an accounting error made by his employee.

Due to increasing depression over the "financial crisis" at his company, Chow wanted to commit suicide but he thought killing his wife and unborn daughter would spare them from the heartbreak and shame of losing a loved one to suicide. He used a fruit knife to stab Francis to death before attempting suicide twice, but survived both attempts.

Chow was later diagnosed with adjustment disorder, which caused him to suffer from an abnormality of the mind at the time of the offence, so Chow's murder charge was reduced to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. He was sentenced to seven years in prison on 26 October 2023.

Background

Victim

Born on 4 September 1991, Isabel Elizabeth Francis, an Eurasian Singaporean, was the second of three children, and had one younger brother (born in 1993) and one elder sister (born in 1988) who was diagnosed with special needs. At one point during her childhood, Francis's parents divorced, and her mother gained custody of all three children, who went to live with their mother and aunt somewhere in the East Coast area of Singapore.

According to her brother Emanuel, Francis and her siblings shared a very close relationship, and together, they would record song covers at home, with Emanuel playing the guitar and Francis singing. Francis and her siblings were raised Catholic, and they regularly went to the Church of Christ the King in Ang Mo Kio, where Francis taught catechism classes.