The parents of a US high-tech researcher found hanged last year in
Singapore accused local police on Wednesday of failing to preserve
evidence and insisted their son was murdered.
The inquest into the death last year of electronics engineer Shane
Todd took an emotional turn on its third day after police staged a
detailed re-enactment of his apparent suicide using an improvised
noose in his own bedroom.
"What we have been discovering is evidence that we cannot rely on.
It has been moved, it has not been preserved," his father Rick
Todd, 58, an airline pilot, told reporters.
The session was abruptly halted for the day after the late
scientist's mother Mary Todd, 57, broke down at the end of two
hours of testimony by a Singapore forensic scientist who did
extensive simulations of the hanging.
The couple are in Singapore to testify at the inquest. They allege
their 31-year-old son was murdered because of his work for a
Singapore institute with alleged links to a Chinese telecom firm
accused of involvement in espionage.
Mary Todd, a Christian pastor, told reporters that Singapore
authorities were neglecting evidence the family had gathered to
show that there were multiple DNA strains on a towel and strap
found around Shane's neck.
"Why are they not looking into the fact that all these things add
up to murder and not suicide?" she said, sobbing outside a
courthouse.
She also took issue with the fact
that the noose suspending her son's body from a bathroom door was
cut and the body laid out on the floor before forensic experts
arrived. Police said it was standard procedure.
"I am very, very disappointed in the process and I want the truth
to be known here in Singapore," the mother said.
"We came to Singapore to find out the truth and we were told that
the (government) and our team would work as a team to find the
truth, that they are not adversarial. Yet they are only looking at
suicide."
Singapore police officers who inspected the apartment where the
researcher was found hanged on June 24, 2012 told the inquiry on
Tuesday they saw no signs of a struggle.
On Wednesday a technology forensic expert rejected a Todd family
lawyer's suggestion that the researcher's mobile phone and laptop
could have been hacked into before his death.
Todd's former employer, Singapore's state-linked Institute of
Microelectronics, and Chinese telecoms giant Huawei Technologies,
have denied the family's claims that they worked together on a
project involving Todd.
At the time of his death Todd had just finished a stint with the
institute, where he was part of a team working on gallium nitride,
a tough semiconductor material that can be used in radar and
satellite communications.
A US congressional committee last year labelled Huawei and ZTE,
another Chinese telecom firm, as potential security threats that
should be excluded from US government contracts and barred from
acquiring US firms.
The coroner's inquest -- set to last until May 28 -- will only
determine the cause of Todd's death. A verdict is expected by late
June.
Todd's parents have obtained an opinion from a US medical examiner
who concluded that he was first killed by garrotting before being
hanged to conceal the crime.
But two other US medical examiners described as independent experts
have affirmed the Singapore autopsy report that Todd hanged
himself, according to a summary of evidence to be presented at the
inquest.
******
Ok, I understand the mom's anguish, but this is getting
farcical...
When someone is hanging, of course first thing to do is cut the
frickin rope and try to see if the person can still be saved!
I can understand that the parents find it hard to accept that
their son committed suicide.
However, this is getting out of hand. As a medic, if I see some
dude hanging on a rope, I would order the riflemen to cut him down
first before I can start trying to revive him. If I tried to revive
him while he was still hanging, my senior medic would probably
shove a rectal probe up my rear end. Without lubrication.
Also, there were many other factors that pointed to suicide.
This guy apparently visited suicide websites and left a farewell
note to his girlfriend. That is quite a major smoking gun in my
opinion.
The fella's colleagues and girlfriend apparently all noticed
that he was suffering from depression. The fact that they didn't think it was
serious enough to warrant suicide is besides the point. A friend of
mine suffered depression ten years ago after his girlfriend left
him. He was still able to function pretty well; he just seemed a
little under the weather.
Which was why we were all in
shock when he tossed himself off a tall building a few days
later.
I'm not saying that murder should be ruled out in this case
without further investigation. I'm just saying that so far
everything has been pointing in the direction of suicide.
