Institute for Migrant Rights
Railway line at Cianjur station, c. 1890 · KITLV, CC BY 4.0

Migration Jurisprudence from the South › Singapore

Public Prosecutor v. Tay Wee Kiat and Chua Ying Ling

High Court of Singapore · Singapore · 2018 · National court

Citation: [2018] SGHC [number to be added]
Type of case: Criminal
Outcome: Decided for the migrant side

Question

Were the sentences for a couple who abused their Myanmar domestic worker adequate?

What the court decided

The High Court increased the sentences on appeal. [Check figures.]

In plain language

A couple in Singapore abused their domestic worker from Myanmar for months. On appeal the High Court gave them longer prison terms.

Dalam bahasa sederhana

Pasangan di Singapura menganiaya pekerja rumah tangga mereka dari Myanmar selama berbulan-bulan. Di tingkat banding, Pengadilan Tinggi memperberat hukuman penjara mereka.

Pertanyaan: Apakah hukuman bagi pasangan yang menganiaya pekerja rumah tangga asal Myanmar sudah memadai?

What happened afterwards

  • 2018: Sentences increased on appeal.

Sources

Open this decision in the interactive collection (compare, filter, Indonesian view, downloads).

Cite as: Institute for Migrant Rights (2026), Migration Jurisprudence from the South, version 0.1, https://theimr.org/court-decisions/d/sg-tay-wee-kiat-2018/. This page summarizes a court decision for research and advocacy; it is not legal advice.

For researchers

This collection of decisions is built for empirical legal scholarship and socio-legal research on migration and the rights of migrant workers, as well as for advocacy.

The coded variables support statistical analysis in law: cross-national comparison, regression and event-history designs, and law and economics questions such as how recruitment fees, wage protection and limits on changing employer affect migrant workers. The data can be downloaded for replication.

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