Source: The Straits Times
WITH Korean singing teacher Jeong Ae Ree – a woman he had met just days earlier – former Romanian diplomat Silviu Ionescu went on a night of revelry on Dec 14 last year.
The couple started with wine at a function at the Shangri-La Hotel, then went on to Clarke Quay, where they had drinks at a Turkish restaurant and watched belly-dancing, before moving on to a karaoke lounge in Sophia Road for more drinks.
Just hours later, a man was killed when he was run over by an Audi A6 embassy car that Dr Ionescu, 49, is said to have been driving.
By that point, she was home and unaware of the accident, said Madam Jeong yesterday, elegantly dressed in black, at the start of a coroner’s inquest into the death of Mr Tong Kok Wai, who was 30.
It was only a week later that she realised what had happened, she said, when the police called her.
No criminal charges have been filed against Dr Ionescu, the former Romanian charge d’affaires, who is in Romania, and as expected, did not show up at yesterday’s inquest.
Mr Alexandru Coseru, the acting charge d’affaires, was present at the hearing, at which 12 witnesses gave evidence. But the star witness of the day was Madam Jeong, 40.
The singing teacher and opera singer described how she had ended up with Dr Ionescu on Dec 14. Both married, they had met only nine days earlier at a concert at the Esplanade Recital Studio. Later, she accepted his invitation to attend the Shangri-La function.
That night, his driver, Mr Marius Trusca, drove them to the hotel, where they started drinking wine at 7.30pm.
About two hours later, Dr Ionescu dispensed with the driver at his condominium. From there, the diplomat drove Madam Jeong in the embassy’s Audi A6 to Clarke Quay, where they downed tequila shots at a Turkish restaurant, and then to more drinks at a birthday party at a karaoke lounge in Sophia Road.
By the time they were done, it was 2am the next day.
Aside from Madam Jeong’s testimony, details of where they were also emerged from security camera footage from the hotel and the Legend Palace KTV lounge in Sophia Road.
The two appeared close, with Dr Ionescu’s arm draped over her shoulder in some clips. In another clip, they locked arms while walking.
Madam Jeong said she asked to go home at 2am. By then, he had had a few glasses of wine and two tequila shots.
She told the court that Dr Ionescu had also had a few drinks at the KTV lounge, but she was not sure whether or not they were alcoholic. “It was probably a mixture of Coke and alcohol,” she said.
She said she was puzzled the next day, when he met her at about 1pm at her Hillcrest Arcadia condominium, and insisted he had been drinking only apple juice and Coca-Cola.
In her statement, she said: “For reasons unknown to me, he tried to explain that he was only drinking juices and Coke the night before and nothing else. He even showed me some medication to prove that he is diabetic.”
Madam Jeong said his explanation then was that he did not want her to think he drank “so much”.
Asked by lawyer Subhas Anandan, for Mr Tong’s family: “But you know deep inside he’s been drinking a lot?”
“That’s what I thought,” she replied.
Mr Tong, a Malaysian, was pronounced brain dead three days after the accident and taken off life support on Christmas Day.
The inquiry continues.
No evidence to suggest car was stolen
IT IS unlikely that the black Audi A6 driven by former diplomat Silviu Ionescu had been stolen, as he had claimed to the Singapore authorities.
Two Audi vehicle experts told the Coroner’s Court yesterday that the car has anti-theft features that make it impossible for it to be driven off with duplicate keys.
There were also no records that the embassy’s car key had been lost or stolen.
Mr Boo Seng Yak, the assessor for all Audi vehicles that get into accidents here, said checks on the Audi A6 did not show any signs that it had been “tampered with or broken into”.
The other expert, Mr Chan Kian Ann, a workshop manager with 19 years’ experience with Audi cars, went as far as to say that he knew of no cases of Audi vehicles being stolen here.
Both men told the court that every Audi A6 comes with three keys that are unique to each car.
Mr Boo said: “This means that if the car is broken into by a person who does not have the authorised ignition key to the car, he cannot drive the car away.”
His checks on the car, found locked and abandoned in Sungei Kadut, came after police inspected it on Dec 15 last year – about 10 hours after Mr Tong Kok Wai was killed in a hit-and-run accident involving the car earlier that morning.
Senior Station Inspector (SSI) Zainuddin Mohamed Saleh, a traffic police officer at the scene, also found no evidence that anyone had tampered with the keyhole of the car door.
The windscreen was smashed, the radiator grille cracked and both the bonnet, and the door on the driver’s side, were dented.
Questioned by Senior State Counsel Lau Wing Yum, SSI Zainuddin said that usually, the police would impound vehicles involved in such accidents for further inspections. However, Dr Ionescu was allowed to claim the car because he “just wanted the car back”.
When lawyer Subhas Anandan, who is acting for Mr Tong’s family, asked why the former diplomat was not told that vehicles involved in accidents are usually impounded, SSI Zainuddin said it was because it was “an embassy car”.
According to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, the property of a diplomatic agent enjoys inviolability.
Key witnesses
MORE than 50 witnesses will testify at the inquest into the death of Bukit Panjang hit-and-run victim Tong Kok Wai – the biggest inquiry held in recent years. The inquiry is scheduled for 16 days. Key witnesses will include:
Singing teacher and opera singer Jeong Ae Ree, 40, the first witness on the stand, who testified yesterday on Day 1 of the inquiry that she and Romanian diplomat Silviu Ionescu had attended a function at the Shangri-La Hotel where he had some wine. They then went to Clarke Quay and a karaoke lounge at Peace Centre in Sophia Road where he had more drinks.
Mr Leong Zi Quan will describe how Mr Tong, 30, was knocked down by a black car at the junction of Bukit Panjang Road and Bangkit Road.
ITE student Muhammad Haris Abu Talib, 18, who was one of two injured in the case, will describe how he was hit at a pedestrian crossing at the junction of Bukit Panjang and Pending Roads.
Taxi driver Neo Hock Beng, 50, whose taxi Dr Ionescu boarded at about 3.30am on Dec 15, will tell the inquiry what the passenger did and about the call he made to the police to report the loss of a car.
About the case
Wai, 30, and his colleague were walking across a pedestrian crossing in Bukit Panjang in the early hours of Dec 15 when a car mowed them down.
The car, a black Audi A6, bore a consular number plate, and was later found abandoned in Sungei Kadut Avenue, off Woodlands Rd.
Mr Tong, a Malaysian, who had wed only a month earlier, died in hospital 10 days later of severe head injuries.
His colleague, Mr Bong Hwee How, 24, from Sarawak, survived and is back in Malaysia recovering from the extensive injuries he suffered.
Both were knocked down at the junction of Bukit Panjang and Bukit Bangkit roads at about 3.10am.
Following this, ITE student Muhammad Haris Abu Talib, 18, was also knocked down while using a pedestrian crossing at the junction of Pending Road.
The State will be calling about 50 witnesses to the inquiry into Mr Tong’s death.
