A Bangladeshi painter who strangled his Indonesian girlfriend after she refused to leave a new man she was seeing told the High Court yesterday that he and the victim had promised, at a mosque, to marry each other.
Ahmed Salim, 31, had even put a ring on her finger at a party with his friends in 2017, an event that was captured on a photo in his mobile phone and shown to the court.
"I treated her as my wife, I never looked at any other woman... the clothes she wore, the things she had, were bought with my money," he said through a Bengali interpreter.
Ahmed is on trial for murdering his girlfriend of six years, domestic worker Nurhidayati Wartono Surata, 34, in a room at the Golden Dragon Hotel in Geylang on the evening of Dec 30, 2018. Prosecutors accuse him of intending to kill the woman.
In his police statements, Ahmed said he decided to kill the woman after he found out about her new boyfriend on Dec 9, 2018. He also told the police that he killed her with a rope because it was easy to keep in his pocket, compared with sharp weapons like knives.
The defence contended that his mental responsibility for the killing was reduced due to a psychiatric disorder and that he had been provoked.
Taking the stand yesterday, Ahmed said he had been angry with the woman for cheating on him many times but he let it go because he loved her.
The breaking point came when she told him that her new boyfriend was better in bed than he was, and he strangled her with a towel from the hotel.
He then removed the towel and wound the rope around her neck.
Ahmed broke down when he was asked by his lawyer Chooi Jing Yen to describe his mental state when his police statements were taken.
He said he knew he would be hanged. "I also want to be hanged. She has died and I also want to die. I don't want to live."
He cried again when he told the court that when he saw the female investigating officer who was taking his statement, he was reminded of his dead girlfriend.
"When I saw her, I hated myself so much that because of a woman, I destroyed my life, I destroyed that person. I came to Singapore and I destroyed everything."
The trial continues.
Selina Lum
