By Chong Shin Yen

HE stole out of an army camp, armed with an assault rifle and with murder on his mind.

His main target: His former girlfriend whom he wanted to punish for dumping him.

He said he also wanted to kill five people whom he hated and planned to use the weapon in a robbery.

But national serviceman Dave Teo Ming, 20, was apprehended without harming anyone after a 20-hour manhunt on 3 Sep last year.

Yesterday, Justice Tay Yong Kwang sentenced Teo to nine years and two months in jail and 18 strokes of the cane for having a rifle, eight bullets and a knife.

He said Teo had committed a very grave offence by taking a rifle and ammunition out of camp for his 'own purposes' - 'especially so in this age of increased security concerns everywhere'.

JUDGE MOVED

But Teo's troubled childhood also moved the judge, who told him: 'My heart hurts for you that so young a man will have to spend some of the best years of his life in prison and undergo so many strokes of the cane.

'Dave, you have had a very hard life. I hope this unfortunate and traumatic wrong turn in your life will make you much more mature and a whole lot wiser and that you will spend the next few years reconstructing your young life.'

Justice Tay then read an adaptation of the biblical passage, To Everything There Is A Season, before passing sentence.

Court documents painted Teo as a troubled man with a painful childhood. And when he was dumped by his girlfriend of four years, he snapped.

His father was in and out of prison for various offences. At the time of Teo's arrest, his father was in jail for drug trafficking.

His mother was a gambler who would cane him and his younger brother whenever she lost money.

Sometimes she beat them for no apparent reason.

Teo told a psychiatrist that they were not 'normal beatings'.

He said: 'The cane anyhow whack, whack until I got bruises.'

His paternal grandparents and aunt also remembered how traumatised he was as a child.

They said his mother would even throw chairs at him.

When he was 7, his parents divorced.

His mother walked out on them, taking his younger sister with her.

Teo and his brother were left in the care of his grandparents.

The beatings did not stop. His uncle, who lived with them, would punch and slap him if he misbehaved.

When Teo was 14, his 12-year-old brother was killed in a road accident near Bedok bus interchange.

Teo's lawyer, Mr K Mathialahan, said the two boys were close and the sudden death was a great blow.

Mr Mathialahan said: 'He missed his brother so much that while he was serving NS, he pasted a photograph of his brother in his cupboard at the camp so that he could always look at him.'

Teo began to 'spiral downwards with disciplinary problems'.

The court was told that he was filled with anger and 'hated everybody'. He became depressed and isolated himself from the family.

He played truant, and dropped out of school in Secondary 3.

TROUBLED IN LOVE

Two years later, at 16, he found love.

Miss Crystal Liew, who was 14, was his schoolmate. But Teo was highly possessive and would be jealous when she went out with her friends. He would call her and demand that she go home immediately.

He was sometimes abusive towards her, both verbally and physically.

Early last year, Teo was posted for a short stint to Taiwan for his national service.

The couple quarrelled constantly and when she wanted out in April, Teo became withdrawn and irritable.

He vented his anger in camp by kicking the cupboard and being rude to his superiors.

When he returned to Singapore, he began stalking Miss Liew, hanging out at her condominium and outside her school, hoping she would change her mind.

He even went Awol (Absent without official leave) from his camp to look for her.

On one occasion, he took a knife along, saying that he would use it to threaten Miss Liew should she refuse to continue their relationship.

Even when he was rebuffed, he refused to leave and ended up spending the night at the stairwell of her condominium.

He was eventually caught and sent to the detention barracks.

Teo, who used to enjoy wearing branded clothes, no longer cared about his appearance. He started drinking to overcome his insomnia and became reclusive.

His psychiatric report stated: 'He became self-destructive and recalls exercising till the point of exhaustion and then denying himself water.'

Then, he hatched a plan to sneak out of Mandai Hill camp with a Sar-21 assault rifle. He told his campmate that he wanted to kill Miss Liew.

Teo was arrested the day after he left his camp.

Yesterday, he pleaded guilty to having the rifle and eight bullets with him in a toilet in Cathay Cineleisure at 8pm on 3 Sep last year.

He also admitted to carrying a 40cm-long knife on 14 Apr last year near Miss Liew's home in Simei.

Teo's grandmother, who suffered from liver cancer, died late last year, while Teo was in remand.

Other than his mother, who turned up briefly but left before he was sentenced, no family members were in court yesterday.

Teo could have been jailed up to 14years for the firearm charge, 10 years for the ammunition charge and three years for the knife charge.

This article was first published in The New Paper on July 8, 2008.

Sigh... why must the boy be so irrational?