Bio

Adrian Lim was born on January 6, 1942, in Singapore. He was the eldest of three children. He studied at Anglo-Chinese School, but left after Secondary One. As a young adult, Lim worked briefly as an informer for Singapore’s Internal Security Department. He later worked for Rediffusion, a radio broadcasting company, for about 14 years as a wireman and bill collector.

Lim married his first wife in the 1960s and had two children. He later bought a flat at Block 12, Toa Payoh Lorong 7, which became the main location connected to the murders. In the 1970s, Lim began calling himself a spirit medium. He claimed he could cure illnesses, remove evil spirits, improve beauty, and solve personal problems. Many of his clients were women who came to him for help.

Lim used tricks to make people believe he had supernatural powers. One of his best-known tricks involved hiding needles inside eggs. He also claimed to go into trances and speak for spirits. Instead of helping people, Lim used fear, lies, and manipulation to control them. He took money from clients and used his fake “treatments” to sexually exploit women.

Lim met Catherine Tan Mui Choo in 1974 after she came to him for treatment. She later moved in with him and became financially dependent on him. After Lim divorced his first wife, he married Tan in 1977. In 1979, Hoe Kah Hong was brought to Lim by her mother. Hoe believed Lim had special powers and became one of his closest followers. Lim later convinced her that her husband, Benson Loh Ngak Hua, was the cause of her problems.

On January 7, 1980, Benson Loh died during one of Lim’s electrocution sessions. His death was first treated as an accident because Hoe gave police a false explanation. By late 1980, Lim was being investigated for rape after Lucy Lau Kok Huang reported him to police. Lim became angry about the investigation and later planned to kill children as revenge.

Murder Story

On January 24, 1981, nine-year-old Agnes Ng Siew Heok disappeared after attending religious classes at the Church of the Risen Christ in Toa Payoh. She was waiting to go home with her sister when Hoe Kah Hong lured her away and took her to Lim’s flat at Block 12, Toa Payoh Lorong 7. Inside the flat, Agnes was drugged with a sedative. The evidence later showed that she was sexually assaulted by Lim. She was then suffocated. The next day, January 25, 1981, her body was found inside a bag near the lift landing at Block 11, Toa Payoh Lorong 7. At first, police had few leads. More than 250 people were reportedly questioned during the early investigation, but the case remained difficult until the second murder occurred.

On February 6, 1981, ten-year-old Ghazali bin Marzuki was playing with his cousins in Clementi when Hoe approached the children and asked for help. Ghazali followed her into a taxi and was taken to Lim’s flat. He was drugged, choked, and drowned. Reports state that burn marks were also found on his back and that there was a puncture mark on his arm.

Ghazali’s body was found on February 7, 1981, near Blocks 10 and 11 in Toa Payoh. This time, investigators found a trail of blood leading from the area near the body to Block 12, where Lim lived with Tan and Hoe. Police searched the building and eventually entered Lim’s flat on the seventh floor. Inside, they found religious items, bloodstains, and other evidence. A piece of paper containing the names of both victims became an important clue.

Lim, Tan, and Hoe were arrested on February 7, 1981. The investigation found that the murders were connected to Lim’s anger over the police rape investigation. The case later became known as the Toa Payoh ritual murders, although court accounts also showed that revenge and manipulation were central parts of the crime. The uploaded source and Singapore Infopedia describe the case as involving claims of blood sacrifice, consumption of blood, and ritual elements.

The trial began in the High Court in March 1983 and lasted 41 days. Adrian Lim, Catherine Tan, and Hoe Kah Hong did not deny their involvement in the killings. Their defence lawyers argued diminished responsibility, claiming that the accused were mentally ill and should not receive the death penalty. The prosecution argued that the three knew what they were doing and had planned the killings. The judges accepted the prosecution’s position.

On May 25, 1983, Adrian Lim, Catherine Tan, and Hoe Kah Hong were sentenced to death. Lim accepted the verdict, while Tan and Hoe appealed on grounds of mental illness. Their appeal was dismissed in August 1986, and later attempts to obtain clemency also failed. Singapore Infopedia confirms that the trio were hanged at Changi Prison on November 25, 1988.

The case shocked Singapore because of the victims’ ages, the manipulation involved, the ritual claims, and the details revealed during trial. It remained one of Singapore’s most widely remembered murder cases and became a major example in discussions of diminished responsibility, cult-like manipulation, and public reaction to violent crime.