Singapore Jails Australian For Hurling Bottle, Killing 73-Year-Old Man
NDTV
Singapore: Andrew Gosling was convicted of "causing death and grievous hurt by a rash act" for throwing a wine bottle at a group of people two storeys below him.
A Singapore court on Friday sentenced an Australian man to five and a half years in prison for killing an elderly Singaporean man and hurting his wife with a thrown wine bottle, in what the judge called an act of religious hostility toward Muslims.
Andrew Gosling was convicted of "causing death and grievous hurt by a rash act" for throwing a wine bottle at a group of people two storeys below him, striking a 73-year-old man and killing him in 2019. The bottle ricocheted and injured the shoulder of the man's wife.
"I agree with the prosecution that the present offence involves an element of demonstration of religious hostility towards Muslims," said judge Victor Yeo. "Such offences could seriously undermine Singapore's racial and religious harmony and must not be tolerated and must be firmly dealt with."
Singapore is a multiracial country of 5.5 million people, of whom about 16% are Muslim, with bigger Buddhist and Christian communities. It has a predominantly ethnic Chinese population with sizeable Malay and Indian minorities, according to the 2020 census. The victims have been identified as ethnic Malay Muslims.
