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[Music] Our episodes deal with serious and often distressing incidents. If you feel at
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any time you need support, please contact your local crisis center. For suggested phone numbers for confidential
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support and for a more detailed list of content warnings, please see the show notes for this episode on your app or on
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our website. It was just after 2:30 p.m. on Monday, September 15, 2003, when two ambulances
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turned into Barker Street, a leafy residential road in the eastern Sydney suburb of
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Kingsford. The ambulances pulled up outside a red brick two-story duplex with a tidy front garden and a low brick
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fence. As they parked, a panic-stricken, disheveled young man with his jumper on
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inside out raced towards them. The man was 24year-old Ram Tawari. Ram lived on the second floor of the
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duplex with his two 26-year-old flatmates, Tay Chaang and Tony Tan Po Chawan. All three were engineering
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students from Singapore attending classes at the nearby University of New South Wales.
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Upon seeing Ram, the paramedics quickly locked their doors. They were understandably on edge,
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having been called to the property about a suspected double homicide. One of the paramedics rolled
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her window down a crack to hear what Ram had to say. He looked bewildered and was
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clearly in a state of distress. Ram told the paramedics that he was the one who'd called for help. Through heavy
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breaths, Ram explained that he'd found one of his flatmates on the floor, bloody and frothing at the
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mouth. As he spoke, the paramedics noted that Ram seemed distracted by the sight
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of his own hands and kept looking down at them. They were smeared with blood. [Music]
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[Music] Police arrived on Barker Street moments later. As they made their way towards
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the duplex, Ram Tawari struggled to make sense of what he'd seen. The 24year-old student, who was
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born in India but raised in Brunai and Singapore, had been in Australia for just over 3 years. He'd been granted a
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mechanical engineering scholarship by the Singaporean armed forces after completing his national service.
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To supplement his scholarship, Ram worked part-time as a security guard, which meant he often caught up on sleep
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during the day. Ram told the first responding sergeant that he'd been sleeping in his
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bedroom when the sounds of the television blaring in the lounge room and something falling woke
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him. Thinking one of his flatmates had simply dropped something, he went back to sleep.
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Sometime later, Ram woke again to a commotion. Over the loud volume of the TV, he heard someone run past his
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bedroom door. Ram thought he heard his flatmate, Tony Tan Pochi, scream, "Help!" But he
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couldn't be sure. Then someone pounded on Ram's door. Ram's first thought was that
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someone was attempting to break in. Then he heard a loud bang as though metal was being hit against
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something. This noise continued for what felt like several minutes. Still suspecting a break-in,
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Ram locked his bedroom door from the inside until the sound finally stopped. He waited a while before
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opening his door and peering out into the hall. To his left, he saw that the back door in the lounge room was
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slightly a jar. To his right, Tony was slumped next to the front door with his back against the wall, his blooded head
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resting on his chest. Blood had pulled around him and a baseball bat and kitchen knife lay by
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his side. Terrified that whoever had hurt Tony was still in the apartment, Ram picked up
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the bat for protection and made his way to the back door. That was when he saw his other
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flatmate, Tae Chaang, lying behind the lounge room couch, his head completely bashed in and blood
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everywhere. Ram quickly closed and locked the back door, then raced back to his bedroom with the bat. He locked
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himself in, pulling a cabinet across the door as a barricade and used his mobile
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phone to call emergency services. Ram told the operator, "I need the ambulance and the police. There's
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been a murder. My two friends are lying dead outside. There's blood all over the
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place." The operator asked exactly what had happened. Ram replied, "I have no idea. I was asleep and I heard this
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screaming. When I turned, my two friends are dead. He said there was a baseball bat
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and a knife at the scene. The operator told Ram to stay put and wait for help to
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arrive. She then asked if his flatmates were definitely dead or possibly just unconscious. Ram said there was too much
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blood to tell. The operator asked if Ram knew CPR. He was wellversed in CPR from his
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time in the military, but he didn't want to try. Both Tony and Charlie Young's faces were so severely covered in blood
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that he didn't think he could do it. The operator asked Ram if it was safe for him to go back out and check if
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his flatmates were still breathing. Terror audible in his voice, Ram replied, "I'm not going back outside
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till somebody gets here. I'm not [ __ ] going back outside. You want to break down the door? [ __ ] go ahead. I'm not
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[ __ ] going back outside." When the operator told Ram that the paramedics had arrived, he took
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the bat and left his room. He walked up to Tony and saw foam around his mouth and bleeding from his head. He
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touched Tony's neck but couldn't feel a pulse. Tony wasn't breathing either. Not wanting to do anything else,
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Ram left the house via the back door and went to tell the waiting paramedics and
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police what had happened. In addition to being incredibly shaken by what he'd seen, Ram voiced a
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disappointment in himself for not going outside when he heard Tony yell for help. I didn't go out, he told the
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sergeant on the scene. I should have but didn't. After I heard somebody being hit, I should have opened the door but
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didn't. Police climbed the small flight of stairs at the front of the duplex. While the lower level was
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occupied by the property's landlords, the second floor served as a convenient sharehouse for students attending the
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nearby University of New South Wales Kensington campus. It was a modest abode with four
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bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a lounge room. The front door opened to a small hallway that the rooms stemmed
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from. With the lounge room at the end of the hall, the back door in the lounge room
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opened to a small verander and a second set of external stairs. These led down to the concrete
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backyard which housed the rubbish bins and other facilities. The home's decor was bland
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with bare white walls, white floors, and cheap furnishings. When the police reached the top of the
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stairs, they found the front door closed but unlocked. The body of 26-year-old Tony
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Tan Po Chawan lay slumped against it in a pool of blood. The officers had to push him
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aside to gain access. Only once they were inside did the true horror become clear.
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Tony's head had been so severely bashed that parts of his brain were visible. He had also been stabbed
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multiple times in the neck, presumably with the blackhandled kitchen knife lying under his right
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leg. One of the wounds was so deep that it had punctured his voice box. Blood was smeared all over the wall
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and across the door frame. The police followed a trail of blood down the hallway towards the lounge room
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and found Tony's prescription eyeglasses smashed to pieces along with several of
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his shattered teeth. Blood spatter, smears, and bloody footprints marked the loun floor, couch,
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and coffee table. The lounge room was sparssely furnished with nothing more than a beige couch, a
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canvas deck chair, a coffee table, and a small television sitting on a flatpack stand. Behind the couch, a makeshift
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desk sat low to the ground with a computer and other equipment on top, the back door to its left.
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As police approached, they could see that the couch and deck chair were splattered with blood and appeared to
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have been pushed slightly out of place. Behind the couch, 26-year-old Tay Chow Young lay in a pool of
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blood. Like Tony, he had sustained numerous blows to the head as well as multiple stab wounds to the
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neck. On the other side of the room, the TV blared at high volume. Ram Tawari was taken to the police
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station where he voluntarily gave two detectives a more detailed statement in an electronically recorded
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interview. Ram couldn't think of anyone who would possibly want to hurt Tony or Charlie Young.
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Both of them were dedicated electrical engineering students who spent the majority of their time focusing on their
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studies, living relatively quiet lives in Australia. Like Ram, Tony was completing
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his degree thanks to a scholarship from the Singaporean armed forces. He'd taken his education
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seriously as he'd hoped to secure a good military career that could help him provide for his parents.
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Having already fulfilled his national service and completed a diploma in architectural technology, Tony hoped to
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rise to the rank of major by the time he was 30. Charlie Young's university tuition
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was paid by his parents who worked as food vendors back in Singapore. He was a computer whiz who
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happily spent his spare time online or at home watching movies. While Tony had gone out with Ram
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on a few occasions, Charlie Young's English was limited, and he associated almost exclusively with other
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Singaporean or Asian students. Neither had any known enemies, nor were they involved with drugs,
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criminal activity, or any shady characters. Ram explained to the detectives that the previous evening of
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Sunday, September 14, had been uneventful. After working a security shift in the day, he'd returned home at
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around 6:00 p.m. and watched the fantasy adventure film Lord of the Rings with Tony and Chia
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Young. The trio had made a few passing comments about the film, but nothing of note was
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discussed. Ram was exhausted, having worked all weekend. He was the first to go to bed at around 9:30 p.m., at which
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point everything was normal. Ram woke up at around 6:30 a.m. on Monday to a phone call from his
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girlfriend, Elva. They spoke for about half an hour during which they arranged to meet at
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uni at 2:00 p.m. that afternoon. Ram got up, ate breakfast, and had a shower, but then went back to
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sleep. He didn't know what time it was when he'd first woken up to the TV blaring
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and the sound of something falling, but the noise had been so innocuous that he hadn't even considered getting up to see
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what it was. It was only when he'd woken for the second time at around 2:10 p.m. that he
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heard the banging sound and screams in the hallway and realized something was horribly wrong.
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He repeated the same story he'd given the emergency services operator and the first responding sergeant about how he'd
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discovered his flatmate's bodies. Ram told the detectives that on his way out to meet the paramedics, he
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went up to Tony and touched his neck to feel for a pulse. He then put his hand to Tony's
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nose to see if he was breathing. He noticed that Tony was frothing at the mouth.
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The blood was falling out of Tony's nose and air too, Ram recalled. Back at Barker Street, Ram
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took detectives on a walkthrough of the crime scene to explain exactly what he'd
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seen when he emerged from his bedroom. He added that when he checked Tony, a spurt of blood had come out of
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his mouth and he'd quote sort of spasomemed. While the blackhandled kitchen knife was
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a generic model that could have come from anywhere, Ram explained that the baseball bat found next to Tony's body
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actually belonged to him. He'd purchased it just 2 days earlier from a sports store in the city, but hadn't had a
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chance to use it yet. Despite a thorough examination of the property, investigators found no
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clues as to who the killer or killers might be. There was no sign of forced entry, nor
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was there any blood or other evidence outside the property to indicate where the perpetrator had fled
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to. Five sets of fingerprints were found throughout the home that couldn't be attributed to one of the tenants or
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their known guests. These prints were put through the police database, but didn't match
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anyone in the system. The baseball bat and a knife were forensically examined, but no usable
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prints were found. Albert Leasher was the landlord who lived on the ground floor of the
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Barker Street duplex. He told police that he and his wife had been in and out of the property
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throughout the day. They kept the side gates locked until they returned at around 1:45
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p.m. Albert said he'd sat down to eat his lunch at 1:50 p.m., but didn't hear any of the commotion taking place
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upstairs. The only person he saw run past the back window was Ram Tawari on his way to greet the first responders.
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The next step for investigators was to look into Chia Young and Tony's movements on the day of the
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crime. The pair had been close friends ever since Tony moved into the Barker Street apartment several months
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prior. Because they were both completing the same degree, they were known to be more or less inseparable around the
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university. On Mondays, they were both scheduled to attend a midday lecture on mobile and satellite communication
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systems. The two typically woke up at around 8:00 a.m., prepared for the day, and then studied for a couple of hours
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before walking to the lecture hall together. The campus was only about a 5-minute walk from their home, and they
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always made the journey on foot. A forensic examination of Tony's computer, which was in his bedroom,
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revealed he'd spent Monday morning at home working on his thesis. He sent two emails to his
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supervisor. the first at 10:42 a.m. and the second at 11:06 a.m. before manually
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shutting the computer down at 12:02 p.m. As fastidious students, Tony and Charlie Young both valued punctuality
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and were always on time for classes. However, several classmates told the police that on Monday, September 15,
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Tony showed up for the 12:00 p.m. lecture around 15 minutes late and alone. His usually neat, gilled hair was
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messy, and disheveled. Some classmates noticed that he seemed distracted, restless, and
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tired. When one of them asked Tony why he was late, he smiled vaguely but said nothing. He didn't seem to be paying
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attention to the lecture, instead turning his head and looking around as though keeping an eye out for
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someone. Unusually, Charlie Young didn't show up at all. Tony and Charlie Young had arranged to
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meet with a classmate named Kevin after the lecture to organize an ethics seminar they'd been working on
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together. But during the lecture, Tony lent over to Kevin and told him they had to cancel the meeting. He gave no
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explanation as to why, simply saying that Charlie Young had something he needed to do.
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The lecture finished a little early at around 1:50 p.m. Afterwards, Tony chatted to some
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classmates and they noticed he appeared uneasy. He was shaking from side to side. One friend asked what was going on
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and Tony responded that he urgently needed to go to the toilet. Other classmates noted that Tony seemed tired
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but otherwise normal. He told one of them that he was going home to sleep. Tony then left the lecture hall
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and began walking up the outdoor staircase that led off campus towards the corner of Oval Lane and Willis
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Street. This was a well-used pathway for students coming and going from the university and was the usual route Tony
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walked home. Just before 2:00 p.m., he passed a friend named Jonathan who asked, "How's
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it going?" Instead of responding with his typical friendly smile and a warm reply,
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Tony grunted, "It's going good." before continuing on his way. Jonathan watched as Tony made his
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way towards a vehicle parked near the top of the steps on Willis Street. Jonathan remembered it because the car
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was facing the wrong way in the one-way street and was also parked in front of a
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no stopping sign. He could see two or three other people inside the car, all of them
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Asian, none of whom he recognized. Jonathan was with his friend Sha, who saw the car and its occupants,
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too. Sha remembered Tony taking his backpack off and approaching the car's open door.
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Tony got into the car, which Jonathan noted as odd because he knew Tony lived in close walking distance to the
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campus. He then watched as the car drove away with Tony inside. Police could find no explanation
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as to why Cha Young hadn't attended uni that day. At the time he was killed, he'd been
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wearing trousers and a jumper with his wallet in his back pocket. Those who knew Charlie Young
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said that was how he dressed when he left the house. If he was hanging around at home,
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he just wore shorts and a t-shirt. The fact that he was dressed suggested that he was either preparing
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to leave the house or perhaps expecting company. Charlie Young's computer was last used
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at 11:58 a.m. The blood spatter and positioning of his body behind the couch indicated that he'd been sitting at the
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low computer table at around this time when someone came up and unexpectedly hit his head from behind with a blunt
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object. The tip of his left index finger was crushed to the point of almost being
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amputated, suggesting that he'd put his hand up to his head after the first blow, at which point he was struck
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again. The force of these two blows was extreme enough to fracture Chariang's skull and cause brain damage.
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Further examination of his brain revealed a substance called amalloid precursor protein, more commonly known as
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beta. This substance only forms when at least 2 hours have passed between a brain injury being inflicted and the
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individual's time of death. The presence of beta indicated that Charlie Young hadn't died instantly, but
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had survived for at least 2 hours after he was first struck in the head. This was a significant finding for
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several reasons. First, the last confirmed sighting of Tony was at 2:00 p.m. and Ram's call to
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emergency services was placed at 2:20 p.m. This meant that Tony was attacked during that short window of time, while
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Chowi Yang was attacked around midday. It also explained why the five stab wounds in Chowi Yang's neck hadn't
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bled much and why no blood was found in his lungs. Investigators believed that these stab
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wounds hadn't been inflicted at the same time as the blows to Chia Young's head,
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but hours later when he was either on the brink of death or postmortem. Based on the forensic
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evidence, investigators believed that Tony returned home through the front door. If he'd entered via the back door,
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he would have instantly come across Charlie Young's body lying behind the couch.
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Yet, when police first arrived at the crime scene, they'd found a pot of chicken wings cooking on the stove,
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indicating that Tony had started preparing his lunch without suspecting anything was a
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miss. He'd also taken his shoes off and put his wallet in his bedroom. From the kitchen, Tony likely
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made his way to the lounge room where the attacker hit him headon, smashing his glasses to pieces.
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At least two blows were administered with such force that Tony's nose was fractured. All eight of his front teeth
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were knocked out and his jaw was broken. Blood smears, footprints, and displaced furniture indicated that he'd
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then fallen to the ground, but managed to get up and run down the hallway in an attempt to escape.
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there. The offender struck Tony in the head several more times, causing at least 12 lacerations and massive skull
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fractures. Bruises on Tony's arms indicated he tried to defend himself, but the ferocity of the attack had
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rendered him powerless. While his head injuries were severe enough to ensure death, five stab wounds
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were also found on the right side of Tony's neck, inflicted one below the other in a brisk, frenzied
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attack. The evidence at the crime scene was disturbing and perplexing. If Charlie Young was first
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attacked at midday, then it meant he lay dying for 2 hours while the offender either lay in wait or left. and then
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returned to kill Tony shortly after 2:00 p.m. At that point, the offender might have detected a sign of life in Charlie
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Young and stabbed him in the neck to ensure he was dead. Yet, strangely enough, while the
00:26:06
baseball bat and knife found next to Tony's body showed traces of Tony's blood and DNA, there wasn't a single
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spot of Charlie Young's blood or DNA found on either [Music] weapon. The evidence at the Barker
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Street crime scene left investigators with more questions than answers. The most obvious being, why would anyone
00:26:35
want these young men dead? By all accounts, Ta Cha Yang and Tony Tan Po Chuan were quiet, polite,
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and intelligent students who kept a low profile while focusing on their education. They were beautiful sons who
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valued their families, with Tony's mother saying that Tony would always help others, including his friends.
00:27:01
Both men lived off modest allowances and nothing was missing to indicate robbery
00:27:06
as a motive. A friend of Tony's told the police, "I can't think of any reason why
00:27:13
anyone would want to hurt Tony. I do not believe that Tony had any friends who I
00:27:19
would not trust." Police considered whether the attacks could have been racially
00:27:25
motivated. There had been a recent wave of kidnappings and extortion attempts against Asian students in New South
00:27:32
Wales, the most recent having occurred just weeks prior. A 19-year-old Vietnamese student was strangled to
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death after a botched kidnapping attempt, while a Chinese student had been kidnapped and assaulted while the
00:27:45
perpetrators demanded a $120,000 ransom from her parents in Beijing. But investigators found no evidence to
00:27:56
support such a motive. And it was quickly ruled out, leaving them to comb through the men's personal lives in an
00:28:02
attempt to discover what, if any, secrets they'd been hiding. It was common for young
00:28:10
Singaporean men to marry before moving overseas to complete their tertiary education.
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Tony had met his girlfriend in an online chat room in 1998 and the two wed in Singapore just a few months before his
00:28:25
murder. She had visited Sydney and stayed with Tony at Barker Street. When questioned by police, she
00:28:33
couldn't think of anyone who would wish Tony harm. A forensic examination of Tony's computer didn't reveal evidence
00:28:40
of infidelity, criminal activity, or anything to suggest that he felt he was in danger. However, the search of Tay
00:28:49
Charles Young's computer was a different story. Charlie Young was married to a woman named Winnie, who was also back in
00:28:59
Singapore. The two met in high school and married in a registry wedding, but they'd had been planning a proper
00:29:05
wedding celebration after Charlie Young completed his degree and moved back home. Tony's wife told police that when
00:29:14
she was visiting Barker Street, she noticed that Charlie Young didn't wear his wedding ring. He only put it on when
00:29:22
Winnie came to visit. Charlie Young's online activity revealed that he'd spent the last few months
00:29:30
before his death in almost daily contact with another woman in Singapore named Jasmine. While it was mostly just a
00:29:39
day-to-day chitchat, their online conversations were often flirtatious and occasionally sexual.
00:29:46
Chia Young made it clear that he was attracted to Jasmine and had romantic feelings for her even though she was
00:29:53
engaged to be married. Police wondered if jealousy could have played a role in the double
00:29:59
homicide. They conducted searches with immigration, but these only proved that neither Jasmine nor her boyfriend were
00:30:07
in Australia at the time of the murders. With no obvious suspects or motives, police turned their focus to the
00:30:16
mysterious car on Willis Street that Tony's uni mates, Jonathan and Sha, had seen him enter mere minutes before he
00:30:24
was killed. Tony accepting a ride home instead of walking was so out of character that police were convinced it
00:30:32
was significant. Either the people in the car had something to do with the murders or they might have witnessed
00:30:39
something crucial that could hold the key to solving the case. Unfortunately, Willis Street
00:30:46
wasn't covered by the university's CCTV cameras, and the descriptions of the vehicle varied. Jonathan described it as
00:30:55
a white four-door sedan, possibly a Toyota Echo, while Sha said it was dark in color.
00:31:02
Police spent hours driving the two young men around the area to see if they could
00:31:07
spot a similar looking car, but it was a fruitless endeavor. As for the occupants of the
00:31:14
vehicle, all Jonathan or Sha could say was that they appeared to be Asian. A man who lived near the victims
00:31:22
told the police that he saw a palecoled car parked in a laneway near Barker Street sometime after 100 p.m. on the
00:31:30
day in question. At around 2:25 p.m., a university student was driving down Barker Street
00:31:37
looking for a park when he saw an olive skinned man who was quote, "not Indian or Caucasian looking around as he made
00:31:47
his way towards a small white sedan parked next door to the murder scene." The man, who appeared to be in
00:31:55
his early 30s, got into the car and it drove away. Another woman described seeing a similar
00:32:02
car driving erratically about 2 km from Barker Street at around 2:30 p.m. She estimated that the vehicle was going 100
00:32:11
km hour in a 50 zone. It almost hit another car as well as a telegraph pole. The woman told the
00:32:21
police, "It wasn't just joy riders. The speed scared me. I had never witnessed this sort of behavior on the road
00:32:31
before. As weeks passed, with no breakthroughs in the case, the police made a public appeal for the driver of
00:32:38
the car to come forward. They said the man had picked Tony up less than 30 minutes before his
00:32:45
body was found and that he could be the vital link in solving the murders. The car was described as light blue or
00:32:54
white and resembling a Toyota Echo. Anyone who had seen a similar vehicle around Barker Street was
00:33:02
encouraged to contact the police. No one came forward, prompting police to issue an international press
00:33:11
release, but still the car and its occupants remained a mystery. Weeks turned into months with the
00:33:21
unsolved case receiving little attention from the Australian media. By May 2004, 8 months had passed
00:33:30
and the killer was still yet to be apprehended. On Thursday, May 27, surviving housemate Ram Tari contacted
00:33:39
the police to let them know he intended to return to Singapore. He told them that his studies hadn't
00:33:46
been going well and there were commitments he needed to fulfill back at home. Ram hadn't booked his flight yet,
00:33:54
but he wanted to check if the police needed anything further from him before he left. The detectives working the case
00:34:02
asked Ram to visit the police station the following morning for one final interview. Ram
00:34:09
agreed. When he showed up the next day as planned, the detectives read him his rights and then sat him down for a
00:34:16
second recorded interview. What Ram didn't realize was that he wasn't being interviewed as a
00:34:24
witness, but as a suspect. For some time, detectives had been dubious of Ram's claims that he'd
00:34:34
slept through the attacks committed right outside his bedroom. While they'd initially been willing to
00:34:40
accept this, this changed after forensic evidence indicated 2 hours passed between the two
00:34:47
attacks. Detectives didn't think it made sense for an outsider to enter the apartment. Plud and Charlie Young, then
00:34:54
leave, only to return hours later to launch the second attack on Tony. Ram was 6t tall and a trained
00:35:03
commando described by France as a bit macho. Why then would he barricade himself in
00:35:09
his room knowing that his friend was outside screaming for help? The fact that there was no sign of
00:35:17
forced entry or robbery also raised suspicion, suggesting that the crimes might have been committed by someone who
00:35:24
either lived there or was welcomed inside. Given how bloody the scene was, it stood to reason that whoever carried
00:35:32
out the attacks would have also been covered in blood. Yet, a forensic examination revealed no blood on any of
00:35:40
the home's external structures, such as the back door, rear stairs, the garden, or surrounding
00:35:47
fences. Detectives believed this was because the offender washed up before leaving.
00:35:54
An inspection of the kitchen and bathroom hadn't revealed any obvious evidence of a cleanup, but further
00:36:00
testing revealed a strong positive for blood in the bathroom sink, as well as a weak positive on the hot water
00:36:07
tap. When police and paramedics had first arrived at Barker Street, Ram Tawari's hands were smeared with blood.
00:36:16
He explained this was because he'd picked up the murder weapons to defend himself in case the offender was still
00:36:22
in the house and that he'd checked Tony's pulse as well. But when Ram was taken to the
00:36:29
police station for questioning, a detective who specialized in crime scene examinations also noted spots of blood
00:36:36
on Ram's feet and ankles. Testing proved that the blood had come from Tony Tan Pochawan. In Ram's walkthrough of the
00:36:48
crime scene, he provided a new detail that could explain this. He said that when he'd gone to check Tony's pulse,
00:36:55
Tony had coughed and blood spurtded from his mouth. The investigators found this
00:37:02
incredibly suspicious. For starters, this was the first time Ram had mentioned such an event. He'd
00:37:10
said nothing of it during his first interview with police. Secondly, Ram was on the phone
00:37:16
to emergency services for 10 minutes and 20 seconds before he claimed to have exited his bedroom and checked on his
00:37:23
friends. Yet, the attack on Tony had been ferocious, and he had likely died within
00:37:30
minutes, making it highly unlikely that he would have coughed up blood 10 minutes
00:37:35
later. The blood spots on Ram's feet and ankles ranged from 1 to 3 mm in diameter
00:37:42
and looked to one forensic detective like medium velocity blood spatter. In other words, it looked like
00:37:50
the result of an impact, not an expiration. The detectives had also noticed some
00:37:58
small discrepancies in Ram's version of events. When Ram first called emergency services to report the murders, he told
00:38:06
the operator that his two friends were dead, that both had been completely bashed in, and that there was blood all
00:38:13
over the place. However, during his first recorded interview at the police station, Ram
00:38:20
told the detectives that he didn't see Charlie Young's body until he was on the phone with the operator and went out to
00:38:27
assess the situation. After seeing Tony's body and realizing the back door was open, Ram
00:38:34
told the detectives that he grabbed both the knife and the baseball bat from next
00:38:39
to Tony. He then went to close the door and quote, "That's when I saw Chia Young. He was lying behind the couch and
00:38:49
was covered in covered in blood, too." The detectives assumed that Ram was unaware that his phone call to
00:38:59
emergency services was being recorded. He therefore told the operator the truth that both of his flatmates were dead,
00:39:08
but then made up what he believed would be a more favorable version of events when speaking to the
00:39:15
police. It wasn't just the forensic evidence and inconsistencies that had roused detectives
00:39:23
suspicions. Shortly after the murders, Ram moved out of Barker Street and into another student share house.
00:39:31
When his new flatmates asked him what he'd witnessed, Rams said he wasn't even home when Tony and Charlie Young were
00:39:38
killed. He said he'd simply returned home to find his flatmates's dead. Another friend told the police
00:39:47
that Ram hadn't even told his own family about the murders, even though they were
00:39:51
very close. With several details in Ram's account not adding up, this left the question of
00:40:02
motive. Ta Charlie Young and Ram Tiari had lived at the Barker Street apartment since July 2002 and Tony Tan Pochawan
00:40:12
since March 2003. Police spoke to multiple witnesses who knew the three housemates and they
00:40:20
all said the same thing. There was no overt animosity between any of them. While there had been some small
00:40:28
domestic disagreements about the cooking and washing up, the trio had sorted this
00:40:32
out by deciding to cook their meals separately. They bought all their own food and labeled it
00:40:40
appropriately. This hadn't created any ongoing tension or friction, and they continued to cohabitate peacefully.
00:40:49
The landlords who lived downstairs also said they'd never seen or heard their upstairs tenants fighting or
00:40:58
arguing. It cost the students $2,172 per month to rent the apartment. Every month, like clockwork,
00:41:07
Xiao Yang paid the entire amount, and his flatmates then reimbursed him for their respective shares.
00:41:15
He also took care of the bills and expenses which were divided among the housemates. When police searched the
00:41:23
property, they'd come across an undated post-it note in Ram's bedroom written by
00:41:28
Charlie Young. It had Ram's name on it along with an itemized list of money he apparently owed to Charlie Young. It
00:41:37
started with an outstanding debt of $1,148, followed by rent for March and Ram's share of bills and
00:41:47
food. A second note found in Ram's bedroom was also confirmed to have been written by Charlie Young.
00:41:55
It was another itemized list of apparent debts that Ram had incurred, including what appeared to be a previously
00:42:02
outstanding amount of $4,445 along with rent and bills for August. It came to a total of
00:42:15
$5,054. The note also listed money owed to Cha Young by someone called Andrew. According to the itemized account,
00:42:25
Andrew owed $500 in bond rent for the months of July and August and more than $1,500 in undisclosed incidental
00:42:34
expenses, which included a $4 charge for toilet paper. However, no one by the name of
00:42:42
Andrew had ever lived at the property. A fourth tenant, a Taiwanese student named Vincent, had resided there during
00:42:51
2002, but he'd moved out around the same time that Tony moved in. Vincent told the police that he'd
00:43:00
returned to the house for a brief stay in July 2003, and that during his visit, Ram mentioned that a friend of his was
00:43:08
supposed to be moving into the spare room. While Vincent couldn't remember who exactly gave him this information,
00:43:16
he recalled that the new tenant was named Andrew and that he was an Australian from the New South Wales city
00:43:22
of Ba'athist. Emails sent from Charlie Young to Ram and Tony in July 2003 also made mention of one of Ram's friends
00:43:33
moving in. When asked about Andrew during a phone call from the police, Rams said he
00:43:41
didn't know anyone by that name and there were no plans for a fourth tenant to move
00:43:47
in. He said he'd met someone at uni who mentioned they wouldn't mind moving into
00:43:52
the Barker Street apartment, but they'd changed their mind and Ram never mentioned it to Tony or Charlie
00:44:00
Young. No one close to Ram had ever heard him mention a friend named Andrew. Despite their best efforts,
00:44:08
investigators found no evidence to suggest who the elusive Andrew was. A forensic accountant examined
00:44:16
Ram's Australian bank accounts and concluded that he hadn't reimbursed Charlie Young his share of the rent or
00:44:23
household expenses since March 2003, 6 months before the murders. Furthermore, on September 10, he
00:44:32
received his wage from the security company he worked for, giving him a little over
00:44:38
$700. After making some other payments, Ram didn't have enough left over to cover the rent due on September 13, let
00:44:47
alone reimburse the money he already owed. Investigators obtained Ram's university
00:44:55
records and discovered that his struggles weren't solely financial. As part of his military
00:45:02
scholarship, Ram was required to maintain good grades. If he failed to do so, he had to pay the tuition money
00:45:10
back. Any debt would ultimately be the responsibility of his brother and cousin as they had signed as guarantors on Ram
00:45:17
scholarship. Records showed that in the second semester of 2001, Ram failed three out
00:45:25
of the five subjects he was enrolled in. He then lied about his results to the military to ensure they'd continue
00:45:32
financing his scholarship. Things didn't improve in 2002. He failed most of his subjects,
00:45:41
leaving him with no choice but to retake the courses before he could submit his grades to the military.
00:45:48
In mid August 2003, 1 month before his housemates were killed, Ram received an invoice from the University of New South
00:45:56
Wales demanding immediate payment of outstanding fees, some of which were almost a year
00:46:03
overdue. In total, Ram owed the university a little over $7,000. Both Tony and Charlie Young had been set
00:46:14
to graduate at the end of 2003, at which point they intended to return to Singapore. The plan was that Ram would
00:46:23
take over the lease as well as the responsibility of paying rent to the landlords.
00:46:29
With the money Ram already owed Charlie Young in rent and expenses along with the overdue fees due to the university,
00:46:36
investigators believed it stood to reason that Ram was under a considerable amount of financial
00:46:43
pressure. Additionally, he knew that Tony was returning to Singapore to pursue a military career, which might
00:46:50
have contributed to a growing anxiety that his poor academic results would be revealed.
00:46:57
Police believed that desperate times had led to desperate measures, prompting Ram
00:47:02
to invent the fictitious character of Andrew to ease his financial pressure by reducing the amount of rent he owed each
00:47:10
month. While this might have momentarily relieved some pressure, the receipt of his overdue university fees finally
00:47:18
pushed him over the edge. [Music] Based on all the information they had gathered, investigators suspected that
00:47:28
Charlie Young had decided to skip his lecture on Monday, September 15, so he could confront Ram about the unpaid rent
00:47:35
and organize his taking over the lease. As they spoke, Ram started to panic about the mess he'd made.
00:47:44
The two began to argue, at which point Ram lashed out, grabbed the baseball bat he'd purchased with this very
00:47:51
confrontation in mind, and used it to bash Chowi Young over the head. Thinking Chowi Young was dead, Ram
00:48:00
then washed himself and the baseball bat clean and waited 2 hours for Tony to return home from his lecture.
00:48:09
Ram killed Tony to cover up what he'd done to Cha Young and to ensure Tony couldn't tell the authorities about the
00:48:15
ongoing financial dispute between the two. Perhaps detecting a sign of life in Chaang, Ram then stabbed him in the neck
00:48:24
to make sure he was definitely dead. He quickly cleaned himself up before calling emergency services and
00:48:32
concocting the false story about sleeping through the attacks. Only when realizing that there was blood
00:48:39
spatter on his feet and ankles did he try to explain its presence by making up the story about Tony coughing up
00:48:48
blood. 8 months after the double homicide as Ram Tawari sat down for his second recorded police interview. He
00:48:55
declined an offer to speak to a lawyer. The detectives put it to Ram that he was the one who killed Charlie
00:49:03
Young and Tony. He flatly denied all of the allegations to no avail. Ram was placed under arrest and
00:49:12
charged with two counts of murder. Seemingly in disbelief, Ram asked, "But what about the people in the
00:49:23
car?" The detectives did not respond. [Music] Ram Tawari was denied bail after being
00:49:34
deemed a flight risk and placed in custody awaiting trial. Upon hearing that he'd been
00:49:40
charged with the brutal slayings of Ta Cha Young and Tony Tan Po Chuan, those who knew Ram were left in utter
00:49:49
disbelief. The allegations simply didn't align with the person they knew. By all accounts, Ram came from a good
00:49:58
home and was part of a loving and supportive family. His father was a recently retired vice principal who had
00:50:05
only ever known his son to behave responsibly and respectfully. Ram had been an outstanding high school student who had
00:50:13
gone on to dutifully perform his national service in Singapore, rising to the rank of
00:50:19
lieutenant. After he moved to Sydney in July 2000, Ram's outgoing and extroverted personality ensured he had
00:50:27
no trouble making new friends. He was something of a social butterfly who loved an audience and
00:50:34
telling a good story. Friendly and generous with his money, Ram was always the first to shout
00:50:41
a round of drinks on a night out. While Ram could be passionate and sometimes got into arguments at the uni
00:50:49
bar, none of his friends knew him to be violent. If anything, they viewed him as
00:50:54
a peacemaker. Ram was the kind of friend who would step in and take care of his mates if one of them had too much to
00:51:01
drink, going out of his way to make sure they got home safely. Ram's girlfriend, Elva,
00:51:08
described him as a calm person who doesn't lose his head over things. She said he's the type of person who would
00:51:16
rather walk away from a situation than let it escalate. For those who knew Ram well,
00:51:23
there was nothing unusual about his claims that he'd slept through the attacks. In addition to enjoying a night
00:51:30
out, Ram was in the habit of studying late into the night, then sleeping throughout the day. It wasn't unusual
00:51:37
for him to get up to attend a morning lecture before going straight back to bed.
00:51:42
On the morning of the murders, Elvira and Ram had made plans to meet at uni at 2:00 p.m. When he didn't show up, Elvver
00:51:51
wasn't surprised. She sent him a text message at 2:10 p.m. that read, "I guess you're still sleeping.
00:52:01
Bye." Elvira was one of only two people Ram had completely confided in about what he'd seen on September 15, 2003.
00:52:11
The other was a close friend Ram had stayed with after the Barker Street property was cordoned off as a crime
00:52:17
scene. According to Ram, his decision not to tell anyone else had nothing to do with an inconsistent narrative, but
00:52:25
was a shamebased response. During his second interview with the detectives, Ram straight up admitted
00:52:33
that he'd lied to several people about not being at the house on the day of the murders. "I heard something happening
00:52:41
that day, and what I did was I shut my door and didn't do anything," he explained. "I feel so bad about that
00:52:50
fact. I hate going and telling people who know me. Yeah, I was in the house, but I didn't do anything.
00:53:00
As for his decision not to tell his parents that his housemates were killed, Ram reasoned that he'd been living out
00:53:06
of home for 6 years and had been self-sufficient during that time. I didn't want to worry my parents,
00:53:13
he told the detectives. That's the way it's always been. If I think I can ride something out without worrying them,
00:53:20
that's exactly what I'll do. Ram was incredulous at the suggestion he could have killed Charlie Young over a
00:53:31
financial dispute. First and foremost, Ram claimed he didn't even owe Charlie Young any
00:53:38
money. The reason his bank account didn't show any payments to Charlie Young was because he and Tony paid their
00:53:44
rent in cash. Even Chaoli Young's wife had told the police that she'd seen Cha Yang carrying
00:53:50
around a stack of cash when she visited Barker Street, which he then took to deposit at the
00:53:57
bank. The detectives presented Ram with the post-it note found in his bedroom detailing that Ram owed Charlie Young
00:54:05
$1,148 for an unspecified debt, followed by a rant and expenses for March. Ram had a simple explanation for
00:54:14
this. He told detectives that the $1,148 equated to 2 months of rent and expenses. This was for the months of
00:54:25
January and February 2003 when Ram had been in Singapore for the summer holidays. He said he'd paid his rent for
00:54:34
December before leaving, and Charlie Young presented him with the Post-it note upon his return in late February.
00:54:42
He had paid that money in March. As for the second note found in Ram's bedroom, which the detective said was
00:54:50
evidence that Ram owed Charlie Young a total of $5,054, Ram pointed out that the word O
00:54:58
wasn't written anywhere on the note. He explained this was because the note was actually a list of cash
00:55:06
payments he had made to Charlie Young, not money that was outstanding. Ram argued that some budget statements
00:55:15
found on Charlie Young's computer supported this. The spreadsheets were made up of
00:55:20
two columns titled inflow and expenses. In one of the inflow columns, Charlie Young had written RAM till July
00:55:30
along with an amount of $4,445. The detectives believed this was evidence that as of July 2003, Ram was
00:55:42
$4,445 behind in his rental payments. But according to Ram, inflow related to money that Charlie Young had
00:55:51
already received. As proof, he reasoned that another item in the inflow column was
00:55:58
called cash, and incoming cash wasn't something that could be owed. Furthermore, on the day of the murders,
00:56:07
Charlie Young had pinned a note to the front door that read, "Bross, if Vincent comes to get his stuff, collect $63 from
00:56:17
him for electricity. Thanks." The $63 that Vincent owed Charlie Young wasn't listed in any of the inflow
00:56:27
columns of his budget statements, which Ram claimed supported the notion that inflow didn't relate to money Charlie
00:56:35
Young was owed. Ram also pointed out that if he hadn't paid his rent or expenses since
00:56:43
early 2003, surely that would have put Charlie Young under considerable financial stress. Yet, he hadn't
00:56:50
complained to anyone about Ram owing him money. In fact, an online message found
00:56:57
on Charlie Young's computer suggested the opposite. In June 2003, 3 months before
00:57:03
the murders, Charlie Young had sent a gift to a friend in Singapore. When the friend messaged to say thank
00:57:11
you, Charlie Young responded, "Ram paying my rent for this month, so I got extra couple of
00:57:20
hundreds." For Ram, the notion that he could have killed his flatmates over $5,000 was
00:57:27
absurd. Even if Ram did owe Charlie Young money, it was a solvable issue. Although Ram's parents weren't wealthy,
00:57:36
they were reasonably well off, and Ram's father had given him ready access to a Singaporean bank account with adequate
00:57:44
funds. If he'd found himself in financial strife, he would have accessed that account. The fact that Ram owed the
00:57:54
University of New South Wales over $7,000 was admittedly a source of stress for him, but he'd been honest with the
00:58:02
police about it. In fact, when he called the detectives the day before his arrest to let them
00:58:08
know his intention to return to Singapore, he'd told them all about his uni issues. Without prompting, he admitted
00:58:16
that he'd failed several subjects and was therefore blocked from reenrolling in his course the coming
00:58:23
semester. As he and his family would be liable to reimburse the military for funds already paid, Ram told the police
00:58:31
he felt he had no choice but to return home and face the [Music] music. As Ram waited for his day in
00:58:41
court, he hired a defense attorney who began looking into the forensic side of things.
00:58:47
While the prosecution claimed to Ram had a lie about being in his bedroom when the attacks took place, forensic testing
00:58:54
of Ram's bedroom after the murders revealed a dust marks on the floor that supported his story about dragging his
00:59:01
cabinet in front of the door to barricade himself in. Crime scene photos also showed a
00:59:07
small cabinet by the door. While prosecutors believed the phone call Ram placed to emergency
00:59:15
services was staged, the defense had a very different interpretation. When the operator asked
00:59:22
if it was safe for Ram to go outside to check on his housemates, he adamantly replied, "I'm not going back outside
00:59:31
till somebody gets here. I'm not [ __ ] going back outside. You want to break down the
00:59:37
door? [ __ ] go ahead. I'm not [ __ ] going back outside. When the operator told him help
00:59:45
was on the way, Ram asked, "Are you going to hang up or are you going to stay on?" The operator asked if Ram wanted
00:59:55
them to stay on the line. He responded, "Could you please till somebody gets here, please?"
01:00:05
Not only did the defense believe that the recording indicated Ram was in a genuine state of distress when he placed
01:00:12
the call, it also proved that he was in his bedroom. When paramedics arrived at Barker Street, Ram told the operator
01:00:20
that he was going to go outside. At this point, the audio captured the increasing sound of the
01:00:27
television, indicating that Ram was walking from his room and towards the living room, just as he later described
01:00:35
in his police interview. Then there was the matter of blood. Despite the large amount of blood
01:00:44
throughout the crime scene, very little was found on Ram. Other than the blood on his hands,
01:00:50
which he'd readily shown to the first officer on the scene, there were just a few spots of Tony's blood on Ram's
01:00:56
clothes, ankles, and feet. Not a single spot of Charlie Young's blood or DNA was found on him
01:01:05
anywhere. As Ram's defense lawyer pointed out to Channel News Asia's current affairs program, Get
01:01:12
Real. If someone's been struck with an item like a baseball bat and that bat gets blood on it, then when that bat's
01:01:20
been swung back, you get castoff blood. And that would include blood going onto the back of the person who's holding the
01:01:28
bat. There was blood on the walls and all around, but not on Ram's back. Investigators reasoned the lack of blood
01:01:39
on Ram was because he had washed himself before calling the authorities. Yet, when a crime scene investigator tested
01:01:46
the Barker Street bathroom for blood, all they'd found was a strong positive in the bathroom sink and a weak positive
01:01:53
on the hot water tap. However, the test was inconclusive as it was also designed
01:01:59
to react to other organic matter and certain metals. A positive test could just as easily be
01:02:07
reacting to rust as to blood. The Uband pipe in the sink was removed and analyzed for blood, but none
01:02:16
was found. Nor was there any evidence to suggest that bleach or any other cleaning agents had been used.
01:02:25
Moreover, when police arrived at the crime scene, the shower recess and laundry sink were both completely dry,
01:02:32
and there were no wet towels anywhere in the house to suggest someone had recently washed
01:02:39
themselves. Investigators were convinced that the same baseball bat had been used
01:02:44
to kill both Tony and Charlie Young, even though not a single trace of Charlie Young's blood or DNA was found
01:02:52
on it. Yet the handle of the baseball bat was covered in fabric, and this too was
01:03:00
dry. If Ram had washed all traces of Chia Young's blood from the bat after using it to kill him, then it stood to
01:03:08
reason that the fabric would have been wet. The brand new baseball bat was still shrink wrapped at the time of the
01:03:16
murders. Pieces of the plastic shrink wrap were found in Tony's wounds, but nowhere on Cha Young.
01:03:24
Ram's defense team reasoned this wasn't because it had been washed between the attacks, but because two separate
01:03:32
weapons were used. The reason none of Charlie Young's blood was on Ram was because he'd had nothing to do with the
01:03:42
murder. During the investigation, some of Tony's friends had told the police that Tony mentioned wanting to buy a
01:03:49
baseball bat for protection. He didn't mention what he wanted protection from, nor did he seem scared.
01:03:56
It was more of an off-the-cuff remark. A friend of Rams thought he recalled seeing a baseball bat in the
01:04:03
Barker Street living room in July 2003, 2 months before Ram purchased the one used to kill Tony. However, no other
01:04:13
bats were found during a search of the property. Although the timing was unfortunate,
01:04:20
Ram's defense didn't think there was anything suspicious about Ram buying the bat 2 days before the
01:04:27
murders. After all, it was Ram himself who'd told the police the bat belonged to him. He still had the receipt and the
01:04:35
transaction was on his bank statement. If this was a premeditated attack, as investigators insisted, then it didn't
01:04:43
make sense for Ram to admit that the bat was his or that he'd keep such an obvious paper
01:04:50
trail. The evidence indicated Tony hadn't arrived home until 2:05 p.m. and had been attacked anywhere between then
01:04:59
and 2:10 p.m. Ram had called emergency services at 2:20. If Ram had committed the crimes, why
01:05:09
would he have called for help so quickly when there was no pressure for him to do
01:05:14
so? Why give himself mere minutes to clean the crime scene, leaving just a small amount of Tony's blood on his feet
01:05:21
when he had plenty of time available to ensure a thorough cleanup? And why clean the baseball bat
01:05:28
after the attack on Chara Young, but not after the attack on Tony? [Music] When Ram Tari's trial began in June
01:05:41
2006, almost 3 years after the murders, the major focus was the blood evidence. The prosecution argued that
01:05:49
the reason none of Charlie Young's blood was on Ram was because he'd washed before murdering Tony.
01:05:56
The defense pointed out there was no evidence to indicate a cleanup had occurred and the only reason the very
01:06:03
small amount of Tony's blood was on Ram was because he had coughed while Ram was
01:06:08
checking on him. The prosecution called two expert witnesses who attested to the
01:06:14
impossibility of this scenario. One testified that Tony's head injuries would have immediately sent him into
01:06:21
such a deep state of unconsciousness that his cough reflex wouldn't have been functional. The other, a forensic
01:06:29
pathologist, agreed with this finding. However, upon cross-examination, he said that the cough reflex is lost gradually
01:06:38
and conceded that there was a remote possibility that Tony was not so deeply unconscious that he'd lost the ability
01:06:45
to cough. A neurologist named Dr. Mark Hirs gave evidence for the defense that the cough
01:06:52
reflex was one of the last things to go in severely injured patients. Dr. Hirs explained that if
01:07:00
damage was only done to the upper part of the brain, as in Tony's case, then the cough reflex could still be
01:07:08
activated. Dr. Hirsh was of the opinion that Tony not only could have coughed as
01:07:13
Ram claimed but that he would have. A neurosurgeon Dr. John Mat agreed. He explained that head injuries
01:07:24
are progressive in nature. Death can be slow occurring after brain stem function
01:07:30
stops and cardiac arrest occurs. Blood found in Tony's lungs indicated that his airway would have been
01:07:38
irritated, which Dr. Mat said would have caused an inevitable coughing reflex. He had witnessed this himself in
01:07:47
another patient. Given the position Tony's body was in, Dr. Mat believed that any
01:07:55
coughed up blood probably hadn't come from Tony's mouth, but through the knife wounds in his neck.
01:08:04
It was significant that the prosecution declined to cross-examine Dr. Mat. As a result of the expert
01:08:12
testimony, the judge instructed the jury that the prosecution's witnesses had not
01:08:17
provided proper evidence to convict Ram Tawari. He stated the state of the medical evidence
01:08:26
at the end of the day is that not only could Tony have coughed, but that he did. Ram chose not to take the
01:08:36
stand. The prosecution attacked his credibility based on what they claimed were the various lies he'd told during
01:08:43
the course of the investigation. There was his story about being asleep while the attacks took
01:08:50
place. the varying claims he'd told to friends about his presence at the crime scene, his denial that he owed any rent
01:08:57
money to Charlie Young, and the creation of the fictitious Andrew. Given all these lies, the
01:09:05
prosecution asked the jury. "Why would you believe anything else?" he said. After hearing all the evidence and
01:09:16
closing arguments, it took the jury 5 days of deliberation before reaching their
01:09:23
verdict. For the murders of Ta Chi Young and Tony Tan Pochan, they found Ramari guilty on all
01:09:32
counts. Some in court noted that the judge seemed genuinely surprised by this verdict.
01:09:40
Nonetheless, he ordered that Ram be removed from the courtroom and taken back to
01:09:45
prison. Ram's parents and brother, who had flown over from Singapore to attend the trial, watched on in shock and
01:09:53
dismay as the bor fled him away. At Ram's sentencing 5 months later, the judge stated that the
01:10:01
prosecution had not established adequate evidence to prove a motive. He said the
01:10:07
offender himself appears to have been a person of good character. Nothing has been produced to suggest that he was
01:10:14
prone to any form of violence. All the indications are that he and his two flatmates got on well
01:10:22
together. At the same time, it is obvious that only the most powerful motive could have provoked the offender
01:10:29
into committing two such extraordinarily violent murders. I am skeptical, however, that a dispute
01:10:36
over the payment of rent could have been sufficient to trigger the extremely violent attacks undertaken by the
01:10:43
offender. But this does not seem to me to matter very much since if the attack on Mr. Tay was provoked by a demand for
01:10:51
rent, it could not be regarded as in the slightest degree mitigating. The judge found no evidence that Ram was
01:11:00
suffering any form of psychiatric or mental health issues at the time he committed the
01:11:05
crimes. He believed the emotion Ram showed during the call to emergency services was genuine,
01:11:13
stating, "The significance of this finding is that although there was a substantial element of premeditation, at
01:11:20
least so far as Mr. Tan's murder was concerned. These acts of extreme violence were not committed with
01:11:27
indifference to the gravity and dreadfulness of what Ram Tawari was doing. I do not doubt that the offender
01:11:35
was emotionally affected by and was fully aware how heinous were the terrible acts that nevertheless he
01:11:43
deliberately committed. While the judge acknowledged that Ram's conviction had been a nightmare for his
01:11:51
family, he added, "At the same time, I should also acknowledge the dreadful sense of loss that has been suffered by
01:11:58
the families of the two murdered victims who lost their lives when they were still young, who had been successful at
01:12:05
their studies, and who had futures full of promise. Their families will continue
01:12:12
to suffer from this terrible loss without remission except for such slight relief as time might
01:12:20
afford. There is no evidence of remorse or contrition, as I do not know what led
01:12:27
the offender to commit these murders. I am unable to make any finding about the likelihood of rehabilitation one way or
01:12:34
another. The judge concluded that Tony Tan poans was the more serious of the two murders,
01:12:43
not because it was intrinsically more heinous, but because it was done to remove a potentially incriminating
01:12:49
witness from the scene, and thus there was no doubt that it was premeditated. Taking these factors into account, the
01:12:57
judge sentenced Ram Tawari to 25 years imprisonment for the murder of Charlie Young and to life for the murder of
01:13:08
Tony. Ram's lawyers appealed his conviction and sentence, arguing the verdicts were unreasonable and lacked
01:13:15
evidentary support. They highlighted the case's many unanswered questions, including Tony's
01:13:22
odd behavior on Monday, September 15, 2003. His apparent knowledge that Charlie Young would be absent from
01:13:29
university that day, and why he unexpectedly accepted a ride from strangers just before his
01:13:36
murder. If Ram was guilty, they questioned why he hadn't concealed key evidence such as notes on rent and the
01:13:44
baseball bat purchase. It took the panel of appellet judges 2 months to return with their decision,
01:13:52
which was handed down in December 2008, 5 years after the double homicide. In addition to agreeing that
01:14:00
the verdicts were unreasonable and unsupported by the evidence, the appellet judges acknowledged that the
01:14:07
inconsistent stories Ram told about what had happened on the day of the crimes did not make him a liar. On the
01:14:14
contrary, their judgment stated the trauma of the events may have been sufficient to cause an innocent
01:14:22
person in his position to be confused about their precise movements and recollection. The statement also pointed
01:14:30
out that if Ram's story was fake, he would be more likely to remember the details.
01:14:36
Their report stated that his version of events were quote so different you might have
01:14:43
thought if he was going to fabricate that he would have got it right especially if he is as the crown says as
01:14:50
cunning as the crown submits he is. The court of appeal quashed Ramari's sentences with the judges finding that
01:15:00
the trial had miscarried. However, they stopped short of acquitting Ram entirely and instead
01:15:08
ordered a retrial. By the time the retrial commenced in August 2009, Ram Tawari was
01:15:16
30 years old and had spent just over 5 years in prison. Although he hired a new defense team and
01:15:24
once again exercised his right to remain silent, the evidence presented by both sides was essentially the same as during
01:15:31
the first trial. The judge reminded the jury that the prosecution did not have to prove
01:15:38
the motive. And again, the jury reached the same verdict, guilty on both counts of murder.
01:15:46
However, this time the judge sentenced Ram to 25 years imprisonment for the murder of Ta Cha Young and only 40 years
01:15:55
for the murder of Tony Tan Po Chawan. This meant Ram would be eligible for parole in 2042, aged in his early
01:16:07
60s. For the next 2 and 1/2 years, Ram continued to maintain his innocence. Again, he appealed his conviction on the
01:16:16
grounds that the jury had reached its verdict based on unfounded evidence. In mid 2012, he was granted a
01:16:25
second appeal hearing in the Court of Criminal Appeal, which went ahead in July 2012. This time, to explain the lack of
01:16:34
blood on Ram or any of his clothing, the prosecution proposed a new theory. They claimed that Ram had committed the
01:16:43
attacks naked and then washed himself clean before calling for help. After a second day of questioning,
01:16:51
the appellet judges requested time to discuss among themselves. While the first appeal bench
01:16:57
had taken 2 months to reach their decision, the second took just 2 days. The Court of Criminal Appeal found that
01:17:07
there was considerable suspicion when it came to Ram's aversion of events. Although the prosecution's case
01:17:14
was plausible, the judges called several aspects into consideration, in particular the lack of forensic evidence
01:17:22
linking Ram to the crimes. They accepted that the small amount of blood on Ram could have come
01:17:29
from Tony coughing as he lay dying. In regards to the suggestion that Ram had committed the crimes naked, the judges
01:17:38
stated if the bathroom had been used by the appellant to wash himself, he would have had to carefully dry the bathroom
01:17:46
surfaces and himself. This would have required clothing or a towel which would have been
01:17:52
wet. No such wet clothes or towel were placed into evidence. Furthermore, if Ram had just bludgeoned
01:18:03
and stabbed Tony in a frenzied attack, the judges stated that the cleanup would have had to be very carefully handled.
01:18:11
Quote, "Sloppy or careless work will see him undone. The killing was in all likelihood done sometime after 2:05
01:18:20
p.m., possibly after 2:10 p.m. By 2:20 or 2:21 p.m., Ram has called emergency services. Not only is this barely enough
01:18:32
time to undertake the task of dispatching Mr. Tan, washing and drying himself, and washing and drying the
01:18:39
bathroom, but it raises the question why he would place himself under such time pressure.
01:18:47
The judges also found that Ram's voice showed genuine fear during the call and that at times it verged on
01:18:55
hysteria. While they acknowledged that emotions could be faked, they concluded, quote, "This would not appear to be the
01:19:04
action of someone who was methodically planned and affected the execution of both Mr. Tay and Tan."
01:19:12
Furthermore, they found that the inconsistencies in Ram's version of events could be explained by the trauma
01:19:19
he'd experienced in having witnessed the battered corpses of his friends. The judges sided with Ram in
01:19:27
asserting that many of the case's more puzzling aspects remained inadequately explained by the prosecution.
01:19:35
They found it reasonable to believe that the murders could have been committed by
01:19:39
whoever picked Tony up from university that day. If the driver of the car had simply
01:19:45
dropped Tony off at home, the judges questioned why they had not come forward to clear their names despite police
01:19:52
appeals for information. However, they also thought it was possible that Ram Tawari knew who that
01:20:00
person or their passengers were and that he might have more knowledge of what happened. Some of his behavior could
01:20:09
have potentially been explained by fear of consequences to himself. While it was
01:20:14
also possible that Ram had some complicity in the killings. Regardless, the possible involvement of
01:20:22
others combined with the lack of forensic evidence connecting Ram to the murders was enough to raise reasonable
01:20:29
doubt in their minds. With that, the judges overturned Ram's conviction and declared that a
01:20:38
third trial would not be necessary. After 8 years in prison, Ram Tawari was a free man.
01:20:50
Ram's period of incarceration had not been easy. Not only was he separated from his family in a foreign country and
01:20:58
struggling to understand a legal system he had no prior knowledge of, the unhygienic conditions of prison life led
01:21:05
Ram to develop obsessivecompulsive disorder. While Ram had always understood and
01:21:12
agreed that the circumstances of what happened on September 15, 2003 were suspicious, he'd spent years grappling
01:21:20
to understand how he could have been convicted for a double murder when so many elements of the case did not add
01:21:28
up. As Ram later wrote in his book titled 99 Months, the case of the Sydney Double Murders, he wondered whether
01:21:37
racism could have played a role. According to Ram, before his trial, a fellow inmate who had been
01:21:44
behind bars for a long time told him, "If you are brownskinned and you are charged with a violent crime, you will
01:21:52
be convicted. If you are yellow skinned and charged with a drug crime, you will be
01:21:59
convicted. If you are Aboriginal, look it, and are charged with any crime, you will be
01:22:06
convicted. If you fall outside those groups, only then does reasonable doubt come into play with the
01:22:14
jury. After his conviction was quashed, Ram returned to Singapore. He spent some
01:22:20
time traveling before returning to normal life, eager to fly under the radar as much as
01:22:27
possible. His years behind bars taught him to be grateful for every small joy in life, such as walking into a store,
01:22:35
enjoying a leisurely walk, or simply leaning out of an open window. In his book, Ram wrote that while he
01:22:43
tries not to be bitter about what happened to him, the question of why he was convicted continues to haunt
01:22:51
him. After years of research and discussions with various groups of people, Ram concluded that it all came
01:22:58
down to human nature on the part of the police and the jury. He wrote, "When tragedy strikes, we need
01:23:07
someone to blame. Most of us have an inherent belief that the system works. That when the police charge someone and
01:23:15
a prosecutor asserts in court that the defendant is guilty, they must be because why would the police
01:23:22
lie? I know this because up till the day of my arrest, I thought exactly the same
01:23:29
way. I discovered the hard way that this is not how the legal system works. It is
01:23:36
just easier to console with the conviction. The two detectives overseeing the investigation into
01:23:44
Charlie Young and Tony's murders were demoted in the wake of Ram's first trial. While Ram is grateful for what
01:23:52
his experience taught him, he claims there is one thing he will never find peace with. his decision to barricade
01:23:59
himself inside his bedroom on the day of the murders instead of going outside to
01:24:05
help. Ram wrote, "My reaction, which I profoundly regret and am so deeply ashamed of,
01:24:13
which I cannot fully explain to myself, much less to anyone else, which will haunt me every living day."
01:24:22
[Music] The news of Ram's aqu quiddle came as a huge shock to the family of Tony Tan
01:24:29
Pochawan who was steadfast in their belief that Ram was guilty and acted alone. Tony's sister told the Get Real
01:24:39
program. How can he be acquitted? Does that mean that my brother died for nothing? What right did Ram have to
01:24:47
appeal? It's like you're digging into the wounds of the victim's families, forcing them
01:24:53
to remember what happened. Tony's death and Ram's subsequent acquitt deeply impacted
01:25:00
Tony's family, who yearned for justice to be served. Seeking spiritual guidance,
01:25:07
Tony's mother visited a medium who advised her not to cry for Tony as it would make him sad.
01:25:14
Standing at Tony's graveside, his mother lovingly stroked a photo of her son, telling, "Get
01:25:21
real. Look at him. So beautiful. So handsome." It hurts us to think about how the bat came down on him. He died a
01:25:31
horrible death. He was beaten to death. It cuts my heart. Each time I come, I cry. But I
01:25:41
can't cry. He said, "I mustn't cry. We'll leave it to heaven. Heaven's watching." While Tony's family has been
01:25:53
vocal about the case, Charlie Youngs have maintained a low profile. They haven't spoken publicly
01:26:00
about the crime and didn't provide victim impact statements to the court. The driver and passengers of the white
01:26:08
car Tony was seen getting into on the day of the murders have never been identified and no one has been held
01:26:16
accountable for the two deaths. The bodies of Charlie Young and Tony were returned to Singapore. Their
01:26:23
time in Australia marked only by the degrees they were postumously granted by the University of New South
01:26:31
Wales. As investigative journalist Malcolm Knox explained in his SPS article, a violent
01:26:39
act. If justice was not delivered to anyone, it was in part because of a failure of
01:26:45
connection. The lives of the three men in that flat were not known deeply enough or sufficiently embedded in an
01:26:53
Australian city for the crime to be solved. The search for the killer or killers remains incomplete.
01:27:02
Just as so many Asian students pass through Australian cities like ghosts, their money taken and their degrees
01:27:10
given, so will these three [Music]