Dawn breaks over Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands, painting the infinity pool in hues of gold that seemed to celebrate the island nation’s relentless ascent from colonial port to global financial fortress.

But inside penthouse 4207, where Italian marble floors catch the morning light filtering through floor toseeiling windows, 58-year-old Richard Tan clutches his chest, his breath coming in ragged gasps that sound like surrender.

Green tea spills across the breakfast table, spreading toward his wife’s perfectly manicured hands.

Her name is Althia Baky, 28 years old, and the panic in her voice as she dials 995 is so perfectly calibrated it could win awards.

But in security footage that investigators will watch 47 times in the coming weeks, there’s something else in her eyes during those 90 seconds before she makes the call.

Something that looks less like shock and more like satisfaction.

In Singapore’s world of ultra-wealthy bachelors and imported brides, some marriages are investments, others are murders disguised as love stories.

And this one, this one had a price tag of $15 million and a prenuptual agreement that was supposed to protect everyone involved.

Richard Tan wasn’t born wealthy.

His father drove a taxi through Singapore’s sweltering streets for 40 years, saving every spare dollar to send his only son to National University of Singapore.

Richard graduated top of his class in computer science in 1989, right as the digital revolution was transforming Asia.

While his classmates joined established firms, Richard saw something different.

He saw the future arriving faster than anyone anticipated, and he positioned himself right in its path.

Tantech Solutions started in a rented office above a chicken rice shop in Chinatown.

Richard and two partners working 18-hour days building enterprise software for Singapore’s emerging financial sector.

By 1995, they had 50 employees.

By 2000, they had contracts with every major bank in Southeast Asia.

By 2010, Richard had bought out his partners and expanded into cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and blockchain technology before most people knew what those words meant.

His first marriage happened at 28 to Vivian Lo, daughter of a shipping magnate, the kind of union that made sense on paper.

They produced two children, Jason and Michelle, raised them in a bungalow on Sentosa Cove, sent them to United World College, and then overseas universities.

But somewhere between building an empire and maintaining a marriage, Richard discovered that success doesn’t keep you warm at night.

The divorce in 2018 was civilized, expensive, and absolutely devastating.

Viven walked away with $30 million, the Sentosa House, and custody of Richard’s dignity.

His children, adults by then, maintained contact, but with the careful distance of people who’d watched their father choose work over family for three decades.

Picture this.

A man who built something from nothing, who transformed lines of code into a $200 million fortune, sitting alone in a penthouse apartment that cost $8 million, but feels empty every single night.

Richard had properties in five countries, a car collection worth more than most people earn in a lifetime, and a calendar filled with board meetings and charity gallas where everyone wanted his money, but nobody wanted him.

The loneliness of the ultra wealthy is a specific kind of torture.

You can’t complain because who has sympathy for a man with nine figure wealth? But money doesn’t answer when you call its name.

Money doesn’t hold your hand when you wake at 3:00 a.

m.

wondering if this is all there is.

Money doesn’t look at you like you matter for reasons beyond your bank balance.

At 56, Richard made a decision that his children would later call desperate and his friends would call understandable.

He contacted Singapore Hearts, an elite matchmaking agency specializing in what they delicately termed cross-cultural union facilitation.

Their offices occupied the 31st floor of a building overlooking Marina Bay, all tasteful decor, and discrete elegance.

Their client list included CEOs, property developers, and at least two members of families whose names appeared on Singapore’s founding documents.

They didn’t advertise.

They didn’t need to.

In certain circles, everyone knew that Singapore Hearts could find you exactly what you were looking for, provided your bank account could support your preferences.

Now, shift your perspective across 1,500 m of ocean to the Philippines.

To Tarlac Province, where rice fields stretch toward mountains and poverty isn’t a philosophical concept, but a daily mathematics of survival.

Althia Baky was born the third of six children in a house with walls made from salvaged wood and a roof that leaked every rainy season.

Her father Ernesto drove a jeep through the provincial capital 14 hours a day, 6 days a week, earning barely enough to keep rice on the table.

Her mother, Rosa, took in laundry from families wealthy enough to pay someone else to wash their clothes, her hands permanently raw from detergent and hot water.

But Althia was different from the start.

While her siblings accepted their circumstances with the resignation that poverty teaches early, Althia studied under street lights because their house had no electricity.

She borrowed textbooks from classmates and copied entire chapters by hand.

She graduated validictorian from Tarlac National High School with test scores that earned her a scholarship to Holy Angel University.

Four years later, she walked across a stage to receive her nursing degree.

the first person in her extended family to graduate from university.

Wearing a white uniform that her mother had sewn by hand because they couldn’t afford to buy one.

Althia’s beauty was the kind that transcended cultural boundaries.

High cheekbones that caught light like architecture, dark eyes that seemed to hold mysteries, and a smile that made people trust her before she said a word.

But she was more than beautiful.

She was intelligent in ways that made her professors take notice, strategic in ways that made her classmates nervous, and ambitious in ways that made her family worried.

“Some doors aren’t meant for people like us,” her mother would say.

Lighting candles at Stoino Church, praying that her daughter’s dreams wouldn’t lead her somewhere dangerous.

For 3 years, Althia worked at Tarlac Provincial Hospital, night shifts mostly, caring for elderly patients whose families had stopped visiting.

She saved every peso beyond what she sent home, studying Arabic phrases from YouTube videos during her breaks, learning about Middle Eastern cultures from Wikipedia articles accessed on the hospital’s temperamental Wi-Fi.

She had a plan.

Nurses could earn five times their Philippine salary in the Gulf States or Singapore.

3 years of overseas work could send all her siblings to university, buy her parents a concrete house, and establish security her family had never imagined possible.

Then came the diagnosis that transformed dreams into desperation.

Her youngest brother, Carlo, 16 years old and brilliant enough to have earned his own scholarship, started experiencing severe fatigue.

The local clinic dismissed it as teenage laziness.

By the time they reached a proper hospital in Manila, his kidney function had deteriorated to critical levels.

Chronic renal failure, the doctor said.

words that sounded like a death sentence to a family without health insurance.

Carlo needed dialysis three times a week at $150 per session.

Without it, he had maybe 6 months.

With it, he could live for years, possibly qualify for a transplant if they could ever afford one.

Altha did the mathematics in her head.

$1,800 per month just to keep her brother alive, plus medications, transportation, and eventually transplant costs that could reach $80,000.

Her salary at the provincial hospital was $400 monthly.

Even if she stopped eating, stopped sleeping, stopped existing for any purpose beyond earning money, the numbers didn’t work.

She applied to nursing positions in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Dubai.

But recruitment agencies wanted $3,000 in placement fees she didn’t have.

She considered loans from informal lenders, but their interest rates were designed to create permanent debt slavery, not solutions.

That’s when she saw the Facebook advertisement targeted algorithms recognizing her demographic perfectly.

Life-changing opportunities for educated Filipino women, Singapore awaits.

The photos showed successful looking women in elegant settings, testimonials about life transformation and family security.

The company was called Singapore Hearts and their pitch was seductive in its simplicity.

Wealthy Singapore men seeking companionship and eventual marriage, professional matchmaking, legal contracts, substantial financial arrangements, purity verified, obedience guaranteed.

The smaller text read, “Words that should have served as warning, but instead sounded like a promise of structure in chaos.

” Althia clicked the link at 2 a.

m.

during her break.

Surrounded by sleeping patients whose labored breathing was the soundtrack of desperation, the application was extensive personal history, educational background, medical information, and dozens of photographs from multiple angles.

There was a section about family financial needs with a check box that read urgent medical situation.

She checked it and typed, “Brother requires immediate dialysis treatment for kidney failure.

Family faces existential crisis without substantial financial intervention.

” 3 days later, she received a Zoom call invitation from Madame Chen, Singapore Hearts director of client relations.

The woman on screen was elegant, mid-50s, speaking English with a crisp Singaporean accent that suggested both education and authority.

Your application shows significant potential, Madame Chun said, reviewing something off camera.

University educated, nursing background, articulate, and your photographs indicate you would appeal to our premium client base.

Tell me, Althia, what are you hoping to achieve through our services? Althia had practiced this answer.

I’m seeking an opportunity for marriage with a stable, respectful partner who values education and family.

I can offer companionship, healthcare knowledge, and commitment to building a proper household.

In return, I need security for my family, particularly medical support for my brother’s condition.

The transactional language felt strange in her mouth, reducing life’s complexity to negotiable terms, but Madame Chun nodded approvingly.

Honesty is valuable in this process.

Our clients appreciate women who understand these arrangements are partnerships with mutual obligations.

You would need to undergo our verification process which is comprehensive and non-negotiable.

Medical examinations, psychological evaluations, cultural compatibility assessments.

Our clients pay premium fees and expect premium verification.

The word that stuck was verification.

Altha’s nursing background meant she understood exactly what that meant.

They weren’t just checking for diseases.

They were verifying her intact state, documenting her as unspoiled merchandise for conservative clients whose traditional values treated virginity as contractual currency.

The humiliation of it burned in her throat, but Carlos’s face appeared in her mind, pale and exhausted in a hospital bed.

He might never leave without her intervention.

I understand, she said, voice steady despite her hands shaking off camera.

What are the typical arrangements? Madame Chen’s smile was professional practiced.

Our highest tier clients offer between $2 million and $5 million in total marriage settlements.

Typically paid in stages.

Initial payment upon contract signing.

Secondary payment upon marriage verification.

Final payment based on length of marriage and any children produced.

You would receive accommodations, living allowance, health care for your family, and eventually permanent residence status.

In exchange, you would fulfill all duties of a traditional wife as outlined in your specific contract.

Althia’s mind calculated faster than it ever had.

Even at the lowest figure, $2 million meant Carlos treatment, her siblings education, her parents’ security, and freedom from the grinding poverty that had defined every generation of her family.

The price was herself, her autonomy, possibly her dignity.

But what was dignity worth measured against her brother’s life? 6 weeks later, Althia sat in the lobby of Raffle, Singapore, wearing a dress that Madame Chen’s assistant had provided.

Appropriate but not provocative, traditional but not old-fashioned, calculated to appeal to a man seeking modernity wrapped in conservative values.

She’d passed every examination, every verification, every humiliating inspection with nurses who documented her body like a medical textbook.

Her file was now complete.

Marked premium candidate, nursing background, urgent family situation.

The urgent situation part was important.

Men like Richard Tan wanted to feel needed, not just wanted.

They wanted to be heroes in their own narratives.

Saviors whose wealth solved problems and earned genuine gratitude.

Richard arrived exactly on time, which Altha noted as a positive sign.

punctuality suggested respect for her time despite the power imbalance in their arrangement.

He was handsome in the way wealthy older men can be well-maintained, expensively dressed with the confident posture of someone who’d spent decades making decisions that mattered.

His online profile had mentioned his height, his business success, his desire for companionship and partnership with the right person.

What it hadn’t mentioned was the loneliness visible in his eyes.

the way he looked at her, not with predatory hunger, but with something sadder.

“Hope, maybe the desperate hope of a man who’d built everything except the things that actually make life worth living.

” “Altha,” he said, pronouncing it carefully, and she appreciated that he’d practiced.

“Thank you for meeting me.

I hope you weren’t waiting long.

” His voice was gentle, uncertain in a way that surprised her.

This was a man accustomed to commanding boardrooms.

Yet here he seemed almost nervous.

She’d expected arrogance, entitlement, perhaps even cruelty.

Instead, she found someone who seemed as uncomfortable with this transactional process as she was, which made the performance she needed to deliver both easier and somehow worse.

Not at all, she said, smiling the way Madame Chan had coached her.

Warm but not too eager, interested, but not desperate.

despite the desperate mathematics running beneath every word.

It’s a beautiful hotel.

I’ve read about raffles, but never imagined I’d actually visit.

The confession of limited experience was strategic, reminding him of the gap between their worlds, while suggesting she was impressed but not overwhelmed.

Richard’s face softened and she recognized the expression.

He wanted to show her things, introduce her to experiences, be the bridge between her provincial Philippine background and his sophisticated Singapore life.

Their conversation flowed with surprising ease.

Richard asked about her nursing career, and Essie described her work with elderly patients, the satisfaction of providing care, the frustration of inadequate hospital resources.

He told her about building Tantech from nothing, the early years of uncertainty, the eventual breakthrough that changed everything.

She noticed he avoided mentioning his divorce directly, but referenced his children with a mixture of pride and regret.

“They’re successful, independent,” he said.

“But somewhere along the way, I forgot that success at work doesn’t compensate for absence at home.

” This was her opening, and Althia took it with practiced grace.

Family is everything, she said, letting genuine emotion color her words.

My parents sacrificed so much for us.

My mother’s hands are scarred from years of laundry work.

My father drove until his eyesight started failing.

They never complained, never gave up on us.

And now my youngest brother, she paused, let her voice catch authentically because this part wasn’t performance.

He’s sick.

Kidney failure.

He’s only 16 and without treatment.

She didn’t finish the sentence.

Didn’t need to.

Richard leaned forward.

Concern immediate and genuine.

What treatment does he need? The question wasn’t rhetorical or polite.

He genuinely wanted to know, wanted to help, wanted to be the person who solved this problem.

And Althia, sitting across from him in a dress chosen by strangers, about to negotiate her entire life like a business transaction, felt something complicated twist in her chest.

Guilt maybe, or recognition that Richard Tan wasn’t actually a villain.

He was just lonely and wealthy.

A combination that made him vulnerable to women like her who were desperate and strategic.

Dialysis three times weekly, she said.

eventually a transplant if we can afford it.

The costs are overwhelming for my family.

She didn’t mention specific numbers.

Let him imagine and fill in the blanks with figures that probably seem small to a man worth $200 million.

Richard reached across the table, took her hand gently, and in that moment, Althia understood exactly how this would unfold.

“Let me help,” he said simply.

“No strings attached, no obligations.

Just let me help your brother get the treatment he needs.

The no strings attached was obviously false.

They both knew it.

This was the opening move in a negotiation that would end with marriage contracts and prenuptual agreements with her family’s survival purchased through her body and her years.

But Richard needed to believe he was offering charity, not buying access.

And Althia needed him to feel generous rather than transactional.

So she let tears fill her eyes.

genuine tears of relief mixed with shame and whispered, “I don’t know what to say.

This is too much.

Say you’ll see me again,” Richard said.

And there was something almost boyish in the request, something that reminded Alia that wealth doesn’t protect anyone from vulnerability.

Let’s not think about arrangements or expectations.

Let’s just see if we enjoy each other’s company.

Over the next 6 weeks, Richard Tan courted Althia Baky with the focused intensity of a man who’d built a tech empire through sheer determination.

Dinners at Odette, burnt ends, and Wakain where single meals cost more than her monthly hospital salary.

Private yacht trips around Singapore’s southern islands where he pointed out landmarks and she pretended she cared about maritime history while actually calculating exchange rates in her head.

shopping trips to Orchard Road where he insisted on buying her designer dresses that felt like costumes for a role she was learning to perform perfectly.

The money started flowing immediately.

$10,000 transferred to her mother’s account for Carlo’s first month of treatment.

Then $20,000 more for specialists and medications.

Updates from home were encouraging.

Carlo responding to dialysis.

Color returning to his face.

Possibility entering their vocabulary again.

Each positive update made Althia’s performance easier and harder simultaneously.

Easier because gratitude didn’t need to be faked.

Harder because the debt she was accumulating wasn’t just financial, it was moral, and she wasn’t sure how those accounts would eventually balance.

Richard introduced her to his friends at a country club dinner, a test she’d prepared for extensively.

She wore modest elegance, spoke when appropriate, laughed at jokes without being loud, demonstrated just enough knowledge about business to be interesting without threatening male egos in the room.

The men approved.

Their wives assessed her with calculating eyes that understood exactly what she represented.

But Singapore’s elite were practiced at polite fiction.

Afterward, Richard was elated.

“They loved you,” he said, and she knew this meant she’d passed an important evaluation.

The proposal came on a Tuesday evening at Marina Bay Sand Sky Park.

The infinity pool glowing behind them as the city’s lights stretched to the horizon.

Richard had planned it carefully, hired a photographer to capture the moment, even arranged for violinists to play in the background.

The ring was extraordinary, $150,000 worth of platinum and diamonds that felt heavy with expectation when he slipped it onto her finger.

“Altha,” he said, voice thick with emotion.

You’ve brought joy back into my life.

I know our circumstances are unusual, but I believe we can build something real together.

Will you marry me? She said yes, of course.

Not because she loved him, but because Carlo needed three more months of dialysis before qualifying for transplant evaluation.

Because her sister needed university tuition.

Because her parents deserved a house with solid walls, because desperation had already made this decision weeks ago.

But she delivered the yes with perfect emotion, with tears that weren’t entirely fake, because some part of her actually wished this could be real, that she could genuinely care for this lonely, wealthy man who was trying so hard to believe money could buy connection.

The prenuptual negotiations revealed the transaction beneath the romance more clearly than any previous interaction.

Richard’s lawyers presented a 40-page document outlining exactly what Althia would receive and when.

$500,000 if the marriage ended within 2 years.

2 million after 5 years, 5 million after 7 years, $15 million after 10 years, monthly allowance of $8,000, luxury condo transferred to her name after 1 year, medical coverage for her entire family, educational funds for her siblings, life insurance policy naming her as beneficiary for $10 million.

In exchange, she would surrender her passport during marriage, maintained by Richard’s lawyers for safekeeping.

All social media accounts would be monitored.

Outside communications limited to approved contacts, she would adopt appropriate behavior for a wife in his social circle.

She would manage his household, attend his business functions, and provide companionship as defined in supplementary clauses that made her face burn reading them.

She would work toward producing children, specifically at least one son, to continue the Tan family name.

Madame Chun advised her to negotiate, push for better terms.

But Althia understood something her agency director didn’t.

The prenup was Richard’s security blanket, his way of believing he was protected from being used purely for money.

The more generous its terms, the more he could tell himself this was a real marriage, not a purchase.

So, she signed every page with steady hands.

And when Richard’s lawyer asked if she had any questions, she smiled and said, “I just want to build a happy life together.

” Richard beamed and his lawyers exchanged glances that suggested they’d seen this performance before and knew exactly how it would end.

The wedding happened 3 months later at Capella, Singapore.

$200,000 worth of elegant celebration attended by business associates who congratulated Richard on his beautiful bride and privately calculated how long before the inevitable divorce.

Altha’s family flew in overwhelmed by luxury they’d only seen in movies.

Her mother crying through the entire ceremony for reasons more complicated than joy.

Jason and Michelle Tan attended, sitting in the back row, their disapproval visible to anyone paying attention.

After the reception, after the speeches and the first dance and the cake cutting that photographers captured from every angle, Richard and Althia finally alone in the penthouse that would become her cage.

He took her hands gently.

I know this started as an arrangement, he said.

But I hope we can build something real.

I want you to be happy here, Althia.

I want us to be happy together.

and Althia wearing a wedding dress that cost more than her father earned in 5 years looked at her husband and felt something close to pity because Richard Tan for all his wealth and intelligence actually believed that happiness could be purchased through contracts and deposits.

He didn’t understand that she was already calculating timelines, already noting that the $10 million life insurance policy plus the post-tenure prenup settlement equaled $15 million, the same amount as the best case divorce scenario.

But one path was guaranteed, while the other required a decade of submission.

It would be another 18 months before that calculation transformed from abstract thought into concrete plan, before the wolf spain plants appeared on the balcony garden, before the green tea turned deadly.

But the seeds were planted on that wedding night in the gap between what Richard hoped for and what Althia had already begun to scheme.

The first six months of marriage unfolded like a carefully choreographed performance where both actors knew their lines, but neither trusted the script.

Altha played the devoted wife with excellence that would have impressed theater critics.

She woke at 5:30 a.

m.

every morning, prepared Richard’s green tea exactly how he preferred it, two teaspoons of premium sencha, steeped for precisely 3 minutes, served in the porcelain cup his mother had given him decades ago.

She laid out his clothes with the precision of a personal stylist, attended his business dinners wearing designer dresses and calculated smiles, and managed the penthouse household with efficiency that made his previous domestic helpers look incompetent by comparison.

But beneath the performance, something darker was taking root.

Richard’s initial gentleness gradually revealed itself as something else entirely.

Control wrapped in concern.

Possession disguised as protection.

He needed to know her location at all times.

Installed tracking software on her phone under the guise of safety.

He monitored her social media, questioned any interaction with other men, even innocent conversations with delivery drivers or building security.

The $8,000 monthly allowance came with itemized expense reports, he reviewed like a forensic accountant examining fraud.

I’m not restricting you, he’d say when she raised concerns.

I’m just ensuring you’re making wise financial decisions.

The condo he promised to transfer after 1 year kept getting delayed.

Market timing wasn’t right.

Lawyers were reviewing documents.

Paperwork was stuck in bureaucratic processing.

Althia recognized these as excuses.

Understood that the condo was leverage he had no intention of surrendering.

The prenuptual agreement guaranteed it after 1 year, but Richard’s lawyers had apparently found interpretative flexibility in the language that meant one year could stretch indefinitely.

Her family situation provided both comfort and complication.

Carlos diialysis continued successfully, his health stabilizing in ways that brought tears of relief when her mother sent video updates.

Her siblings enrolled in better schools.

Her parents moved into a small concrete house with actual glass windows and a roof that didn’t leak.

Every month, Althia transferred $3,000 from her allowance.

Watching her family’s circumstances improve while her own autonomy evaporated, the mathematical exchange felt increasingly unbalanced.

She was purchasing her family’s survival with her own imprisonment, and Richard seemed to tighten his grip every week.

The breaking point arrived on a Tuesday evening in March, 6 months and 12 days into their marriage.

Althia discovered emails on Richard’s laptop left open in his study while he took a phone call, messages with Amanda Co.

, his 35-year-old business partner, discussing strategy for Tanteka’s expansion into emerging markets.

The content was professional, nothing explicitly romantic, but the tone carried an intimacy that made Althia’s chest constrict with something she didn’t want to examine too closely.

Amanda understood Richard’s world in ways Althia never could.

Spoke his language of market disruption and venture capital.

Shared his cultural references and educational background.

When Richard returned, Althia confronted him with steady voice despite trembling hands.

Who is Amanda Co.

? The question hung between them and she watched his expression shift from surprise to defensiveness to something uglier.

She’s my business partner.

Why are you reading my private correspondence? The accusation reversed quickly.

Made Althia the transgressor rather than him.

I wasn’t reading.

The laptop was open, she said, maintaining composure.

The emails seemed quite friendly for a professional relationship.

Richard’s face hardened in ways she hadn’t seen before.

You’re being paranoid and frankly it’s unbecoming.

Amanda has been my colleague for 8 years.

Your jealousy reflects insecurity.

Not any impropriy on my part.

He stood, adjusted his watch, preparing to leave for a dinner meeting Althia suddenly suspected might involve Amanda.

I think we need to reconsider your allowance.

$8,000 is generous.

Perhaps too generous.

If you have time to imagine problems that don’t exist, we’ll reduce it to 5,000 until you demonstrate more maturity.

The punishment was calculated, designed to remind her of her dependence, and it worked.

Althia needed that money for her family’s support.

Couldn’t afford reduction without devastating consequences back home.

She swallowed her anger, lowered her eyes in the submissive gesture he seemed to expect.

I’m sorry I overreacted.

The apology tasted like poison, but Richard’s expression softened immediately.

I appreciate you recognizing that.

Now I have a dinner meeting.

Don’t wait up.

After he left, Althia sat in the penthouse that felt less like luxury and more like an elegantly decorated prison cell.

The Marina Bay view stretched before her.

Billions of dollars of real estate visible from their 42nd floor windows.

But she couldn’t leave the building without Richard’s security team noting her movements.

She opened her laptop, the one Richard had given her, with monitoring software he thought she didn’t know about, and began searching with careful deliberation.

First, she researched the prenuptual agreement language in detail, downloading legal analysis of similar contracts.

The 10-year timeline for maximum payout felt impossibly distant.

She’d be 38 by then, a decade of.

Her youth surrendered to this gilded cage.

The divorce option before 10 years meant walking away with minimal funds.

Certainly not enough to secure her family’s long-term needs.

Carlo would eventually need a kidney transplant costing upward of $80,000.

Her siblings needed years of educational support.

Her parents deserved security in their aging years.

Then she searched something else, fingers hesitating over the keyboard before typing, “Life insurance policies Singapore Law.

” The results explained that beneficiary designations were legally binding unless contested with substantial evidence of fraud or coercion.

Richard’s $10 million policy named her explicitly, combined with inheritance rights as his wife, particularly if his children’s relationship remained strained.

The total estate settlement could reach $15 million or more.

Altha stared at the screen, watching cursor blink in the search bar, and typed four more words that would change everything.

Undetectable poisons, symptoms, heart attack.

The search results were extensive, detailed, and terrifying in their specificity.

Medical journals discussed various toxins that mimicked natural cardiac events.

Forums debated theoretical scenarios with the detached curiosity of people who believed they were engaging in intellectual exercises rather than actual murder planning.

Her nursing background meant she understood the terminology, could follow the pharmacological explanations, recognized which substances would be most difficult for standard autopsies to detect.

She told herself this was just research, just theoretical exploration, just understanding her options in a situation that felt increasingly unbearable.

But part of her, the part that had grown cold watching Richard’s controlling behavior intensify, knew exactly what she was actually doing.

She was planning his death with the same methodical precision she’d once used to plan patient care rotations at Tarlac Provincial Hospital.

Two weeks later, Jason and Michelle Tan arrived at the penthouse unannounced while Richard attended a board meeting.

Althia answered the door with practice politeness, but Jason pushed past her without waiting for invitation.

“We need to talk,” he said, voice hard with barely contained hostility.

Michelle followed, closing the door with deliberate gentleness that somehow felt more threatening than her brother’s aggression.

“Your father isn’t home,” Althia said, maintaining composure despite her racing heartbeat.

“You’re welcome to wait in the living room,” but Jason shook his head, pulled out his phone, and displayed a document that made Althia’s blood run cold.

“We hired investigators.

We know exactly what you are.

” The private investigation report was comprehensive and devastating.

It detailed her connection to Singapore Hearts revealed the AY’s transactional nature that Richard had apparently convinced himself was legitimate matchmaking.

It showed her financial desperation, her brother’s medical needs, the timeline of Richard’s payments to her family.

Most damning, it referenced a previous relationship with an Australian widowerower named Jeffrey Patterson, who had died mysteriously in Manila 2 years earlier.

The case ruled accidental death, but never fully investigated due to inadequate resources and convenient witness statements.

Jeffrey Patterson fell downstairs in his hotel, Michelle said quietly, her voice carrying more menace than her brother’s shouting.

Hotel where you worked as a private nurse during his visit.

He’d updated his will 3 days before, leaving you $50,000.

Quite a coincidence.

Althia’s mind raced, calculating responses and consequences.

The Patterson situation had been different.

Actually had been an accident despite how it appeared on paper.

But these two didn’t care about truth, only about protecting their inheritance.

That was tragic accident, she said carefully.

I was investigated and cleared completely.

Cleared because the Manila police are underfunded and overworked, Jason countered.

But we’re not.

We’ve documented everything about you, Althia.

your desperation, your patterns, your willingness to do whatever necessary for money.

And we’re telling you right now, we’re having fathers will revised.

You’ll get nothing beyond the prenup minimum.

The threat should have frightened her.

But instead, Althia felt something else crystallizing.

Anger cold and calculating.

She looked at Jason’s expensive watch, Michelle’s designer handbag.

Their entitled confidence that Daddy’s money would always protect them.

Interesting, she said softly.

Should I mention to your father about Jason’s gambling debts? The ones you’ve been hiding from him, $200,000 to illegal betting syndicates? Or perhaps Michelle’s affair with her husband’s business partner? The one documented in those hotel receipts you thought were private? The siblings expressions shifted from confidence to shock.

Althia had done her own investigating during lonely nights in the penthouse, had discovered that Richard’s children had their own secrets worth protecting.

“You want to threaten me?” she continued, voice steady despite trembling hands.

“Remember that I live with your father.

I know his medical records, his routines, his vulnerabilities.

I know which lawyers he trusts, and which business partners want him to retire so they can control Tantech.

I know everything about this family now, and mutually assured destruction is a game I understand perfectly.

Michelle recovered first, her face hardening.

This isn’t over, but they left without further threats, and Althia understood she’d won this particular battle while losing any hope of peaceful coexistence.

The tan children would be watching her now, documenting her movements, waiting for mistakes, which meant whatever she planned next needed to be absolutely perfect.

That night, after Richard returned home and fell asleep beside her, Althia lay awake staring at the ceiling.

The Marina Bay lights reflected off expensive fixtures in their bedroom, and she thought about trajectories.

How a nursing student from Tarlac had arrived in this penthouse through desperation and calculation.

How a lonely tech mogul had convinced himself that youth and beauty could be purchased alongside genuine affection.

How everyone in this situation was using everyone else.

And the only question remaining was who would successfully complete their transaction first.

She thought about Jeffrey Patterson who really had fallen down those stairs despite what investigators suspected.

She thought about her brother Carlo healthy now because of Richard’s money.

She thought about the Wolf Spain plants she’d researched extensively, how they grew easily in tropical climates, how their alkaloids were devastatingly effective and notoriously difficult to detect in standard toxicology screens.

and she thought about green tea served every morning at precisely 6:45 a.

m.

in a porcelain cup that had belonged to Richard’s mother.

A ritual so established that its disruption would be more noticeable than its continuation.

The transformation from theoretical research to actual planning took 3 months of meticulous preparation that would have impressed military strategists.

Althia approached murder the way she’d once approached nursing exams with systematic study, careful note-taking, and absolute attention to detail.

But this time, failure meant more than a bad grade.

Failure meant prison or death penalty in a country known for swift and certain justice.

Her first acquisition was innocent enough.

Altha developed an interest in gardening, claiming she needed a hobby to fill the long hours while Richard worked.

He approved immediately, pleased she’d found an activity that kept her occupied and visible on the penthouse balcony where security cameras could monitor her movements.

She spent weekends at nurseries across Singapore, purchasing exotic plants with the enthusiasm of a genuine hobbyist.

Orchids, ferns, decorative bamboo, and among them carefully selected specimens from an Australian supplier who shipped throughout Southeast Asia.

The wolf spain arrived labeled as aenitum ornamental species.

Technically legal for decorative purposes, though its toxicity was well documented in medical literature.

Althia planted it in an attractive ceramic pot positioned prominently among other flora where Richard commented approvingly on her developing green thumb.

“The garden looks beautiful,” he said one evening, never suspecting that beautiful purple flowers contained alkyoids concentrated enough to stop a human heart within hours.

Her nursing background proved invaluable for the technical aspects.

She understood pharmacocinetics, how toxins moved through the human body, what symptoms would appear at various dosage levels.

Aconotine, the primary alkyoid in wolfpain caused cardiac arhythmia that mimicked natural heart attack, especially in patients with pre-existing conditions like Richard’s hypertension.

The key was precise dosage enough to be lethal, but not so much that symptoms would seem suspicious.

Extraction required careful chemistry that Althia performed during weekday afternoons when Richard attended marathon board meetings.

She harvested Wolf’s bane roots, dried them using the penthouse oven set to low temperature, then processed them into concentrated powder using a coffee grinder purchased specifically for this purpose and disposed of immediately after.

The powder dissolved readily in liquids, remained stable at room temperature, and was virtually tasteless in strong flavored beverages.

Her test run was calculated and terrifying.

She added minute quantity to Richard’s green tea one Tuesday morning, a dose barely threshold of pharmacological effect.

Within an hour, Richard complained of mild nausea and dizziness.

Must be something I ate at dinner last night, he said, taking antacids.

Althia watched him carefully, monitoring symptoms with clinical detachment.

The reaction confirmed potency while establishing that standard dose would be rapidly effective.

More importantly, Richard attributed his discomfort to food rather than his morning tea, exactly as she’d intended.

The psychological descent during these months was something Althia documented in encrypted digital journal.

Password protected files she believed were secure, but would ultimately provide prosecutors with road map of her deteriorating morality.

The entries revealed a woman wrestling with justification, transforming murder from unthinkable act into rational solution.

March 23rd, he reduced my allowance again down to 4,000.

Says I’m spending frivolously though I’ve shown him every receipt.

The control is suffocating.

Sometimes I think about just leaving, but then what happens to Carlo? What happens to my family? Richard has made me dependent.

And now he’s using that dependence like a weapon.

April 15th.

Saw him with Amanda again today.

They think I don’t notice how they look at each other.

Maybe nothing is happening, but the emotional intimacy is obvious.

He shares things with her that he won’t discuss with me.

I’m his wife, but she’s his partner in ways that actually matter to him.

I’m just the young attractive accessory who manages his household and warms his bed.

May 8th, 2 years until the prenup starts paying meaningful money.

730 days of this prison, but the life insurance is active now.

Has been since our wedding.

$10 million.

That’s security for my entire family for generations.

That’s Carlos transplant, my siblings education, my parents’ retirement, and freedom for me.

The math is simple, even if the morality isn’t.

June 19th, Jason confronted me again today when Richard was out.

Said they’re monitoring me, documenting everything, building case to contest the will.

He actually said, “We know what you’re planning, but he doesn’t.

Not really.

He suspects I’m a gold digger waiting for divorce payout.

” He has no idea I’m thinking bigger than that.

The journal entries showed rationalization process that psychologists would later analyze in academic papers about the psychology of spousal murder.

Each entry justified the next step built narrative where Althia was victim rather than perpetrator.

Where Richard’s death would be liberation rather than crime.

She convinced herself he deserved this for his controlling behavior, for his broken promises, for the cage he’d built around her with contracts and surveillance.

By July, Althia had refined her plan to precise timeline.

The 2-year wedding anniversary was approaching in October.

She’d execute the plan shortly after when the prenup’s first tier technically vested.

Even though Richard was delaying the condo transfer, the timing would seem natural.

Unfortunate cardiac event in a man with known risk factors, no obvious connection to anniversary date that might raise suspicion.

She established patterns that would support her eventual performance.

She mentioned to friends at her weekly Pilates class that Richard had been stressed, working too hard, complaining of chest pains.

She posted concern messages on social media about work life balance and the importance of health monitoring.

She researched symptoms of heart attack extensively on her monitored laptop, creating digital trail that would look like worried wife educating herself rather than murderer planning her crime.

The final month before execution, Althia’s behavior showed increasing sociopathy that even she might not have fully recognized.

She could smile at Richard during dinner while mentally calculating the dosage that would kill him.

She could make love to him at night while visualizing the 995 call she’d placed the next morning.

The compartmentalization was almost complete.

The woman who’ cried lighting candles at Stoino Church in Tarlac, completely buried beneath the calculating killer she’d become.

Richard, for his part, noticed nothing.

His wife seemed content, even loving.

She prepared his meals with care, maintained the household perfectly, attended his business functions with appropriate grace.

If anything, he thought their marriage had settled into comfortable routine.

He still controlled her movements and monitored her spending, but that felt natural to him, appropriate masculine authority in a traditional marriage.

He genuinely believed Althia was happy or at least acceptably satisfied with the arrangement.

The security footage from their building would later show Althia’s movements during the final week.

Daily trips to the balcony garden, spending 30 minutes each afternoon among her plants.

shopping trips to the organic market where she purchased green tea, the premium Sancha Richard preferred quiet evenings at home.

The picture of domestic tranquility while behind her eyes calculations ran constantly.

On March 14th, 2022, the night before execution, Althia lay awake listening to Richard’s breathing.

He slept peacefully beside her, one arm draped across her waist in unconscious possessiveness.

Even in sleep, she thought about turning back, about choosing different path, about the possibility that she could simply endure another 8 years until the prenup maximized.

But then she thought about Jason and Michelle working to cut her out of the will, about Richard’s tightening control that seemed to worsen monthly, about the life insurance policy that provided guaranteed payout versus the uncertain prenuptual timeline.

She thought about her brother Carlo, healthy now and preparing for university because of her sacrifice.

About her siblings who’d never known hunger since she’d married Richard.

About her parents living in a house with solid walls for the first time in their lives.

About the debt she’d accumulated to save them, and how that debt could only be paid through Richard’s death.

At 4:30 a.

m.

, she rose quietly, dressed in the darkness, and went to the kitchen.

from a vitamin bottle hidden behind cooking oils in the cupboard.

She extracted small plastic bag containing white powderine concentrated and lethal.

She measured exactly 15 drops of liquid extract, the dose her research indicated would cause rapid cardiac arrest in a man Richard’s age and health status.

She placed it in a small vial, stored it in her pocket, and began preparing breakfast as she did every morning.

The green tea ritual was so established that deviation would have seemed strange.

Two teaspoons of sanchcha steeped for 3 minutes served in his mother’s porcelain cup.

This morning, Althia added one additional ingredient with hands that didn’t shake at all.

The trembling would come later during her performance for paramedics and police.

Right now, she was calm, focused, ready to complete the transaction that had really been negotiated the moment she clicked on that Facebook advertisement 18 months ago.

Richard joined her at 6:45 a.

m.

exactly, kissed her head, complimented the breakfast spread.

“You’re amazing,” he said, and meant it.

“I’m so lucky to have found you.

” Althia smiled, poured his tea, and watched him drink while behind her eyes.

A countdown had already begun.

By 7:30 a.

m.

, Richard Tan would be dead.

By 8:23 a.

m.

, Althia Baky would be a widow.

And by the time investigators started asking questions, she’d have had months to perfect the performance of a grieving wife who’d lost her beloved husband to tragic, unpreventable cardiac arrest.

The only question remaining was whether her performance would be good enough to fool everyone who mattered, or whether the careful planning would unravel under scrutiny that she couldn’t entirely anticipate.

Richard Tan’s final moments unfolded with the terrible precision Althia had calculated, yet somehow faster and more visceral than her clinical research had prepared her for.

At 7:15 a.

m.

, he finished the green tea, praised the flavor with genuine appreciation, and stood to retrieve his briefcase from the study.

At 7:18 a.

m.

, his hand went to his chest, fingers pressing against his sternum in unconscious gesture of discomfort.

“Strange,” he murmured more to himself than to Altha.

“Heart feels like it’s racing.

” Altha looked up from her own untouched tea with perfectly calibrated concern.

Are you all right, darling? Maybe you should sit down.

Her voice carried just the right mixture of worry and calm.

The trained nurse assessing a patients symptoms while maintaining composure.

Richard waved her off.

That masculine dismissal of physical vulnerability she’d observed countless times.

I’m fine.

Probably just stress from the Jakarta expansion deal.

Too many late nights reviewing contracts.

But at 7:23 a.

m.

, his face went pale in ways that Althia recognized from her hospital years, the grayish tint around his lips, the sudden perspiration on his forehead despite the airconditioned penthouse, the way his pupils dilated with the body’s panic response to catastrophic internal failure.

He gripped the edge of the breakfast table, knuckles white, breathing coming in sharp gasps that sounded like someone drowning on dry land.

Althia, he said, and his voice had changed, fear replacing confidence.

Something’s wrong, really wrong.

She stood, moved toward him with the efficient grace of someone trained in emergency response, and watched him collapse, not dramatically like in movies, but in stages.

First to one knee, then his hands slipping on the marble floor, then his whole body crumpling in ways that would have been comical if they weren’t so absolutely final.

His eyes found hers.

And in that moment, Althia wondered if he knew if somewhere in his failing consciousness, Richard Tan understood that his young wife had just murdered him with the same methodical precision she’d once used to monitor patients vital signs.

She waited 90 seconds exactly, watching his chest heave with a regular rhythm, watching his fingers twitch against the imported Italian marble, watching the life drain from a man who’ believed money could purchase loyalty and contracts could guarantee affection.

Then she pulled out her phone and dialed 995 with fingers that trembled authentically now.

Adrenaline finally breaking through her calculated calm.

My husband collapsed.

He can’t breathe properly.

Please, you need to send someone immediately.

The panic in her voice was perfect because it was partially real.

Not panic about Richard dying that was proceeding exactly as planned, but panic about the performance she needed to maintain for the next hours, days, weeks.

The emergency operator’s voice was steady, professional, walking her through CPR instructions that Althia followed with deliberate ineffectiveness.

chest compressions too shallow.

Rescue breaths mstydimed.

The appearance of desperate attempt without the actual technique that might have helped if anything could have helped at this point.

The paramedics arrived at 7:38 a.

m.

rushing into the penthouse with equipment and urgent efficiency.

Altha had moved away from Richard’s body, was sitting on the floor with her arms wrapped around her knees, rocking slightly in universal gesture of shock.

He just collapsed, she told them, voice breaking.

One moment he was fine, the next he couldn’t breathe.

He has high blood pressure, takes medication, but this morning he seemed normal until suddenly he wasn’t.

They worked on Richard with professional intensity, administering cardiac drugs that Althia knew would actually worsen a conotene poisoning, a detail she’d specifically researched.

The alkyoid interfered with sodium channels in heart cells, and standard cardiac medications would amplify rather than reverse the effects.

But paramedics treating an apparent heart attack in a 58-year-old man with known risk factors would follow standard protocols would do exactly what she’d anticipated they’d do, and every intervention would drive Richard closer to the death she’d engineered.

At Singapore General Hospital’s emergency room, Althia maintained her performance flawlessly.

She provided Richard’s complete medical history with the precision of a nurse who’d monitored her husband’s health carefully.

blood pressure medication, mild diabetes managed through diet, family history of cardiac disease.

All accurate information that painted a picture of a man whose sudden death, while tragic, fit a comprehensible medical narrative.

The ER doctors worked with focused intensity.

But at 8:23 a.

m.

, the senior physician emerged from the trauma bay with an expression Althia had seen countless times during her nursing career.

Mrs.

Tan, I’m very sorry.

We did everything we could, but your husband suffered a massive cardiac arrest.

Despite our intervention, we were unable to revive him.

He’s gone.

The words were delivered with practice sympathy, and Althia responded with a collapse so convincing that nurses had to catch her.

had to administer sedation, had to move her to a private room where she lay with eyes closed, occasionally releasing perfectly timed sobs that made the staff exchange sympathetic glances about the poor young widow who’d lost her husband so suddenly.

Jason and Michelle Tan arrived within an hour, their expressions mixing genuine grief with immediate suspicion.

Jason’s first words delivered in a harsh whisper outside Althia’s room were captured by hospital security footage that investigators would later analyze frame by frame.

This is too convenient.

Dad was healthy and now suddenly he’s dead with her as the sole beneficiary of everything.

Michelle placed a restraining hand on her brother’s arm.

But her eyes when they finally entered Althia’s room carried the same calculation.

The police presence was routine for sudden deaths.

uniformed officers taking preliminary statements with the dispassionate efficiency of people who’d seen countless similar situations.

Altha, still performing sedated grief, provided a timeline that was meticulously accurate because truth was always easier to remember than lies.

They’d woken at normal time.

She’d prepared breakfast as usual.

Richard had seemed fine until he suddenly wasn’t.

He mentioned chest pains occasionally.

She added, “A lie inserted among truths, but he refused to see a cardiologist.

Said he was too busy with work.

” The initial autopsy was scheduled as standard procedure for sudden deaths, but the preliminary assessment from the ER physician suggested straightforward cardiac event in a man with risk factors.

The case might have closed there, filed as tragic but medically explicable death if not for Dr.

Lim Wei Ming, the forensic pathologist whose thoroughess bordered on obsessive.

Dr.

Lim had spent 23 years examining bodies, had developed instincts that transcended standard medical training, and something about Richard Tan’s case triggered those instincts immediately.

The heart showed damage consistent with massive cardiac arrest, but the pattern was unusual.

Most heart attack victims showed significant arterial blockage, the accumulated plaque that strangled blood flow until the heart gave up.

Richard’s arteries, while not pristine, showed relatively minor disease for a man his age with his risk factors.

The level of blockage didn’t match the catastrophic nature of his cardiac failure.

Dr.

Lim ordered extended toxicology screening beyond the standard panel, specifically requesting tests for botanical alkyoids that weren’t routinely checked.

3 days later, the results arrived with findings that transformed routine death investigation into potential homicide.

Trace amounts of aconotine, the primary alkyoid from akenite implants commonly known as wolf spain, were detected in tissue samples.

The concentration was small, the compound metabolized quickly, but its presence was unambiguous and absolutely inconsistent with natural death or accidental exposure.

Dr.

Lim immediately contacted the commercial affairs department and detective inspector Sarah Co was assigned to a case that would consume the next 8 months of her career.

Die co was 42 years old, 15-year veteran of Singapore’s police force with specialized training in financial crimes that often over overlapped with domestic homicides in the citystate’s wealthy communities.

She’d seen variations of this story before.

Older wealthy men, younger foreign wives, substantial inheritances, suspicious deaths, but each case required meticulous evidence gathering, and Singapore’s legal system demanded proof beyond any reasonable doubt.

Her first interview with Althia took place one week after Richard’s death in the penthouse that now felt like a crime scene despite its luxury.

Altha had recovered from her performed grief enough to function, was dressed in appropriate morning black, and received DIO with the exhausted courtesy of someone too drained for deception.

“I want to help however I can,” Althia said and meant it because she genuinely believed her planning had been thorough enough to withstand scrutiny.

Tell me about your husband’s routine.

Die co asked recording the conversation with Althia’s permission, particularly his morning routine.

Altha described the green tea ritual, the breakfast routine, Richard’s predictable schedule with the accuracy of someone who’d lived it daily.

Did he take any supplements or medications that morning? Dieo continued, watching Altha’s face carefully for micro expressions that might indicate deception.

his usual blood pressure medication,” Althia replied.

He kept vitamins in the kitchen cupboard, but I don’t recall if he took any that morning.

Everything happened so fast.

The detail about vitamins was noted would later prove significant, but in that moment, Dio was more interested in establishing timeline and opportunity.

Mrs.

Tan, I need to ask directly.

Were you aware that your husband’s toxicology showed presence of a connotine? A poison derived from wolf spain plants.

Altha’s reaction was textbook perfect because she’d rehearsed it mentally dozens of times.

Shock, confusion, then dawning horror.

Poison? That’s impossible.

How would Richard have been exposed to poison? Her nursing background made the question professionally appropriate, and DIo noted the response without revealing her own assessment.

That’s what we’re trying to determine.

Are you familiar with aenitum plants from nursing school? Althia said carefully.

We studied various toxic plants as part of pharmarmacology training.

But I haven’t encountered them professionally or personally.

The lie was delivered smoothly, but it was also stupid, a mistake born from arrogance.

Because while Althia spoke, Jason and Michelle Tan were meeting with DIO’s colleagues, presenting evidence from their private investigation that would demolish Althia’s carefully constructed innocence.

The evidence was comprehensive and devastating.

Internet service providers cooperating with police warrants recovered Althia’s browsing history showing months of research into undetectable poisons, Aconotine specifically, symptoms of poisoning and Singapore’s autopsy protocols.

Her encrypted journal, backed up to cloud storage she believed was secure, was partially recovered by digital forensic specialists.

The entries provided a road map of permeditation that prosecutors would later read aloud in court.

Each sentence another nail in Althia’s coffin of culpability.

Jason and Michelle also provided financial analysis showing Althia’s timeline awareness, her knowledge of the prenup schedule, and her potential inheritance through life insurance and estate settlement.

They documented her movements, photographed her balcony garden, even obtained purchase records from nurseries showing her acquisition of various plants, including the ornamental aenitum species that now seemed far less decorative than deadly.

The search warrant was executed 2 weeks after Richard’s death.

20 officers arrived at dawn, methodical and thorough, photographing and cataloging everything in the penthouse.

The balcony garden was examined plant by plant and the Wolf Spain specimens were immediately flagged and removed for analysis.

The kitchen was processed like a crime scene.

Every bottle, jar, and container tested for alkaloid residue.

Behind cooking oils in the cupboard, forensic technicians found a vitamin bottle containing white powder that field tests indicated was highly concentrated aotine extract.

Althia’s computers, phones, and tablets were seized despite her lawyer’s protests.

The encryption on her journal was sophisticated, but not sophisticated enough, and digital forensics recovered 87% of her entries, including the most damning passages that revealed not just intent, but detailed planning.

May 8th, the life insurance is active now.

$10 million.

That’s security for my entire family for generations.

The math is simple, even if the morality isn’t.

The arrest came at 6:00 a.

m.

on a Tuesday morning, exactly 3 months after Richard’s death.

Althia was taken into custody with minimal drama, processed through the system with bureaucratic efficiency, and placed in an interview room where DIO methodically presented the evidence that had accumulated.

The autopsy showing aotine poisoning, the wolf spain plants in Althia’s garden, the concentrated poison in her kitchen, the browser history revealing months of research, the journal entries documenting her psychological descent from desperate wife to calculating murderer.

Ms.

Baki, Diko said, using Althia’s maiden name deliberately.

You have the right to remain silent, but I want you to understand the evidence against you is overwhelming.

We have motive, means, and opportunity.

We have your own written documentation of planning this murder.

The only question now is whether you want to explain why or whether you want to let the court decide your motivations.

Altha’s lawyer, a competent criminal defense attorney named Elizabeth Wong, advised immediate silence.

But something in Althia broke in that moment.

The careful compartmentalization that had sustained her through months of planning and execution suddenly collapsing.

I researched it,” she admitted.

And Elizabeth Wong’s sharp intake of breath was audible.

I researched the plants and the poison, but I never meant to actually do it.

It was just fantasy, just a way to cope with feeling trapped.

The partial confession was worse than complete denial or complete admission.

It acknowledged guilt while attempting to minimize it, a strategy that would prove legally disastrous.

Elizabeth Wong stopped the interview immediately, but the damage was done.

Althabaki was formally charged with first-degree murder, and Singapore’s legal machinery began grinding toward trial with the inexraable momentum of a system that prided itself on efficiency and certainty.

The trial of Althia Baky began 8 months after Richard Tan’s death in Singapore’s high court, where justice was administered with the precision the citystate applied to everything from urban planning to financial regulation.

The courtroom was packed daily.

Public gallery filled with spectators drawn by the tabloid elements of the case.

Wealthy older husband, beautiful younger foreign wife, exotic poison, and the eternal question of whether this was murder or a desperate woman’s survival instinct pushed past breaking point.

Justice Tan Sriamad presided.

A 62-year-old jurist known for intellectual rigor and impatience with dramatic courtroom theatrics.

Singapore’s legal system didn’t use juries for criminal trials, meaning Althia’s fate rested entirely with a single judge whose reputation for strict but fair application of law offered no comfort to the defense.

The prosecution team was led by senior state council Marcus Lim, a methodical lawyer who’ successfully prosecuted 47 murder cases in his 23-year career, losing only three.

The prosecution’s opening statement painted Althia as a cold-blooded killer who’d married for money and murdered when divorce settlements seemed inadequate.

The evidence will show systematic premeditation spanning months.

Marcus Lim told the court his voice carrying the certainty of someone whose case file was 4 in thick with documented proof.

Ms.

Baky researched poisons extensively, acquired the specific plant needed to produce a connotine, extracted and concentrated the alkyoid with knowledge gained from her nursing training, and administered a lethal dose to her husband in his morning tea.

This wasn’t a crime of passion or temporary insanity.

This was calculated murder motivated by greed, executed with clinical precision.

The witness testimony unfolded over three weeks, each day adding layers to the prosecution’s narrative.

Dr.

Lim Wei Ming, the forensic pathologist, explained how aotine poisoning mimicked cardiac arrest but left distinctive markers in tissue samples.

The concentration detected in Mr.

Tan’s system was approximately 15 mg, he testified.

a dose specifically calculated to cause rapid cardiac arrest while potentially avoiding detection in standard toxicology screens.

This wasn’t accidental exposure.

This was deliberate poisoning by someone with medical knowledge.

Diarak co walked the court through the investigation chronologically, presenting evidence with the systematic thoroughess that had built her reputation.

The internet search history was displayed on courtroom screens, months of queries about undetectable poisons, aconotine, specifically symptoms of cardiac events, and Singapore’s autopsy protocols.

Each search was timestamped, showing progression from general research to specific planning.

Ms.

Baky’s browsing history shows 237 searches related to poisoning over a 4-month period.

Di testified this wasn’t casual curiosity.

This was systematic research with clear intent.

The journal entries were perhaps most damaging.

Altha’s own words providing prosecutors with evidence of premeditation that no amount of defense strategy could effectively counter.

Marcus Lim read selected passages allowed.

His voice devoid of inflection, letting the words speak for themselves.

May 8th entry.

The life insurance is active now.

$10 million.

That’s security for my entire family for generations.

The math is simple, even if the morality isn’t.

June 19th entry.

Jason confronted me again today.

Said they’re monitoring me, building a case to contest the will.

He has no idea I’m thinking bigger than divorce settlements.

Jason and Michelle Tan testified with barely contained emotion, describing their father’s final months and their growing suspicion of Althia’s intentions.

She was always performing, Michelle said from the witness stand.

Every gesture, every word felt calculated.

Dad couldn’t see it because he wanted to believe he’d found genuine affection.

But my brother and I saw through her from the beginning.

The defense’s cross-examination attempted to paint the children as jealous and biased, protecting their inheritance rather than seeking justice.

But their testimony reinforced the prosecution’s narrative of a predatory woman who targeted a lonely, wealthy man.

The forensic evidence was irrefutable.

Botanists confirmed the Wolf Spain plants in Althia’s garden contained high concentrations of aconotine alkaloids.

The white powder found in her kitchen tested positive for highly concentrated aconotine extract.

Processed in ways that required deliberate chemistry rather than accidental exposure.

Most damning, residue analysis of Richard’s favorite teacup showed trace amounts of the same alkyoid.

placing the poison directly in the delivery mechanism Althia had used daily to serve his morning beverage.

Elizabeth Wong’s defense strategy was necessarily limited by the overwhelming evidence.

So, she pivoted to mitigation rather than innocence.

Her opening statement portrayed Althia as a victim of systemic exploitation, a desperate woman from desperate circumstances who’d been trafficked into an abusive marriage disguised as legitimate arrangement.

My client isn’t denying that Richard Tan died from a conotene poisoning, Wong told the court.

But the prosecution’s narrative of cold-blooded killer ignores the context of her situation.

Althabaki was trapped in a marriage that was essentially legalized human trafficking, controlled by a man whose wealth gave him absolute power over her existence.

The defense witnesses attempted to establish Richard’s controlling behavior and Altha’s deteriorating mental state.

A psychiatrist testified about post-traumatic stress disorder common among foreign brides in controlling marriages, describing how prolonged psychological abuse could lead to dissociative episodes and impaired judgment.

Ms.

Baky presented with classic symptoms of someone experiencing ongoing domestic control.

Dr.

city.

Raman testified.

The monitoring of her movements, the financial control, the isolation from her support network, these are all hallmarks of coercive relationships that can severely impact mental state and decision-making capacity.

Altha’s mother appeared via video link from the Philippines.

An elderly woman whose weathered face and calloused hands told their own story of poverty and sacrifice.

My daughter is good person.

Rosabbachi said in halting English tears streaming down her face.

She only tried to save her brother.

Save her family.

She not kill her.

She victim of system that sell poor girls to rich men like products in market.

The testimony was emotionally powerful but legally irrelevant to the question of whether Althia had deliberately poisoned her husband.

When Althia took the stand in her own defense, the courtroom was absolutely silent.

She’d lost weight during eight months of detention.

Her youthful beauty now carrying an edge of hollowess that made her look simultaneously younger and older.

Elizabeth Wong walked her through a narrative of exploitation and desperation.

And Althia delivered it with quiet conviction that might have been compelling if not for the journal entries and search history that contradicted her claims of unplanned impulsive action.

I was trapped, Althia testified, voice barely above a whisper.

Richard controlled everything.

My money, my movements, my communications with my family.

I couldn’t leave without condemning my brother to death.

Couldn’t stay without losing my mind.

The research about poisons, it started as fantasy, a way to imagine escape when no real escape existed.

I never consciously decided to kill him.

That morning, I was in a dissociative state, moving through routine without real awareness of what I was doing.

The cross-examination was devastating.

Marcus Lim methodically walked Althia through her own journal entries, forcing her to read passages that explicitly described planning and calculation.

Ms.

Baku, you wrote on July 12th.

I’ve refined the dosage to 15 drops, enough to cause rapid cardiac arrest without raising immediate suspicion.

Does that sound like fantasy or dissociative state? Althia’s composure crumbled under the relentless questioning.

her explanations becoming increasingly contradictory and implausible.

You researched inheritance laws, Marcus Lim continued, displaying browser history on courtroom screens.

You calculated insurance payouts.

You documented the prenuptual vesting schedule.

You even searched for how long before life insurance pays out after suspicious death.

These aren’t the actions of someone in a dissociative state.

These are the actions of someone carefully planning murder for financial gain.

The closing arguments crystallized the two competing narratives.

Marcus Lim presented Althia as embodiment of calculated evil.

A woman who’ coldbloodedly murdered a man who’d shown her generosity and affection.

Richard Tan paid for her brother’s medical treatment, he reminded the court.

He supported her entire family financially, gave her a life of luxury she could never have achieved otherwise, and she repaid his generosity by poisoning him with a substance she’d specifically researched and cultivated for that purpose.

This is first-degree murder with aggravating factors of permeditation and betrayal of marital trust.

Elizabeth Wong’s closing portrayed Althia as product of systemic failure, a victim of marriage trafficking who’d been pushed beyond rational limits.

Yes, Althia Baky caused Richard Tan’s death, she conceded, but she did so as a desperate woman with no other escape from a situation that amounted to legalized imprisonment.

Singapore’s laws allow wealthy men to essentially purchase foreign wives through agencies that operate in legal gray zones, creating power imbalances so severe that women become commodities rather than partners.

My client’s actions were wrong, but they were also predictable outcomes of a system designed to exploit vulnerable women.

Justice Ahmad took two weeks to review the evidence and render his verdict.

When court reconvened, the public gallery was overflow capacity, international media present, and Altha sat with hands folded, face pale, but composed.

The judge’s summary was thorough and devastating, acknowledging the difficult circumstances while rejecting the defense’s mitigation arguments.

The court recognizes that Ms.

Baky entered this marriage from a position of economic desperation.

Justice Ahmad began.

The court also acknowledges that certain aspects of the marriage involved controlling behavior that no person should endure.

However, the evidence of premeditation is overwhelming and irrefutable.

He continued, “Reading from prepared remarks that cited case law and legal precedent.

The journal entries demonstrate clear intent formed months before the actual murder.

The research history shows systematic planning rather than impulsive action.

The acquisition and processing of poison required deliberate chemistry and careful timing.

Most significantly, Ms.

Baky had alternatives available to her.

She could have sought assistance from Philippine embassy officials, from domestic abuse organizations, from police authorities.

Instead, she chose murder as her solution.

And that choice, regardless of circumstances, constitutes first-degree homicide under Singapore law.

The verdict was delivered in formal tones that had ended countless criminal cases.

The court finds the defendant, Althia Baky, guilty of murder in the first degree.

Althia’s face remained impassive, but her hands gripped the edge of the defendant’s box until Knuckles went white.

Her mother’s whale was audible through the video link, and in the public gallery, Jason and Michelle Tan embraced, crying in what seemed to be equal parts grief and relief.

Sentencing occurred 2 weeks later with victim impact statements from Richard’s children that painted a portrait of a flawed but fundamentally decent man who’d been betrayed by someone he tried to help.

My father wasn’t perfect, Jason said, reading from prepared remarks.

He could be controlling and he made mistakes in how he conducted this marriage.

But he didn’t deserve to die.

He showed Althia generosity, paid for her family’s needs, and tried to build a relationship despite the transactional origins.

She repaid him with calculated murder, and that deserves the harshest penalty available under law.

Justice Ahmmed’s sentencing statement balanced acknowledgement of mitigating factors with the severity of the crime.

This court has considered Ms.

Baki’s difficult background, her lack of prior criminal history, and the systemic issues that contributed to her situation.

However, premeditated murder cannot be excused by desperation.

Ms.

Baky had months to choose different path, to seek help, to remove herself from the situation through legal means.

Instead, she planned and executed a murder with clinical precision.

The sentence is life imprisonment with minimum of 20 years before parole eligibility.

The death penalty, technically available for murder in Singapore, was not pursued due to mitigating circumstances.

But life imprisonment in Chongi women’s prison was hardly merciful.

Althia showed no visible reaction to the sentence.

Her face a mask that betrayed nothing of her internal state.

As guards led her from the courtroom, she looked once toward her mother on the video screen.

And for just a moment, the mask slipped, revealing something that might have been regret or might have been simply exhaustion.

One year after sentencing, the aftermath of Richard Tan’s murder continued rippling through multiple lives and systems.

Altha adapted to prison with the same systematic efficiency she’d once applied to nursing and murder planning.

She worked in the prison library, taught English to other inmates, and reportedly showed remorse in private conversations with the prison chaplain, though she maintained in letters to her family that she’d been victim of circumstances beyond her control.

Her family in the Philippines carried complicated grief.

Carlo, whose leukemia treatment had been funded by Richard’s generosity, completed successful remission and enrolled in university.

His survival a direct result of his sister’s devil’s bargain.

Rosabaki aged visibly in the year following Altha’s conviction, carrying shame and gratitude in equal measure.

Grateful her children lived but destroyed by the knowledge of what that survival had cost.

The family rarely discussed Althia except in whispers, her name becoming associated with both salvation and damnation in their household narrative.

Richard’s estate was settled with mathematical precision.

The life insurance claim was denied immediately due to murder exclusion clauses and the prenuptual agreement was voided by Althia’s criminal conviction.

The entire $200 million estate was divided between Jason and Michelle who used portions to establish the Richard Tan Foundation supporting exploited foreign workers.

The foundation became their father’s legacy, perhaps more meaningful than any business success.

Born from tragedy, but aimed at preventing similar exploitation.

The broader impact extended to Singapore’s marriage agency industry and legal framework.

Parliament debated new regulations for international matchmaking services, implementing enhanced scrutiny of large age gap marriages and mandatory counseling before marriage visa approval.

Three additional cases of suspicious deaths involving foreign wives and wealthy older husbands were reopened for investigation, revealing patterns that had been ignored or dismissed as isolated incidents.

In Chongi women’s prison, Althia Baky had 19 more years before parole eligibility.

19 years to contemplate the mathematics that had seemed so simple when she’d clicked that Facebook advertisement.

$10 million had transformed into a life sentence.

Her family salvation had cost her freedom, her youth, and ultimately her soul.

And Richard Tan, who had believed money could purchase affection and contracts could guarantee happiness, remained dead at 58, killed by the woman he tried to save, and who decided he was worth more dead than alive.

The story had no heroes, only victims created by systems that commodified human relationships and desperation that transformed good people into killers.

And in the gap between those competing truths, justice had been served in the only way Singapore’s legal system knew how.

Precisely, certainly, and without mercy for anyone involved.