Megan Khung's death: MSF to conduct 'further review' on case, including on response by authorities

The Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) will carry out a further review on Megan Khung's death, it said in an Apr. 11 statement.

This comes after its earlier statement on the case was met with feedback that it "came across as implying that certain parties could have done more to avoid the tragic death of [Megan]".

MSF previously said that Megan's preschool had noticed injuries, but noted that the incident report did not "fully describe" their severity.

This resulted in inadequate interventions by the relevant agencies, it said then.

The new review will include responses of all parties — including the preschool, Beyond Social Services, the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA), the Child Protective Service (CPS), and the police.

It will also contain additional information that Beyond shared in the wake of MSF's initial statement.

The findings will be published when ready.

Background

In 2019 and 2020, Megan was subjected to 13 months of physical and psychological abuse by her mother and her boyfriend, that led to her death at a condominium in Paya Lebar.

She was four years old.

The couple, 29-year-old Foo Li Ping and 38-year-old Wong Shi Xiang, were sentenced to 19 years' and 30 years' jail respectively on Apr. 3.

According to MSF's statement on Apr. 8, Megan's preschool had first noticed "visible injuries" on the girl.

The preschool, which is run by Beyond, then submitted a report to ECDA in April 2019.

However, the report did not fully describe the severity of the injuries, MSF said.

This resulted in inadequate interventions by the relevant agencies, it said.

In response, Beyond said that its teacher had followed protocol by informing a case worker when bruises were observed on Megan.

It had also made multiple attempts to contact her mother to confirm the girl's safety, after she was withdrawn from the preschool.

Feedback from the ground

MSF's first statement was met with feedback from the Singapore Children's Society (SCS) and professionals in the sector.

SCS said in an Apr. 9 statement that although there were shortcomings in how the preschool surfaced the abuse concern, it was a "collective failure of the system at that time" that had led to Megan's death.

Cindy Tay, a director at the Children's Aid Society, also posted on her LinkedIn about the case.

She questioned whether it was fair for one agency to be "unfairly singled out", when various agencies also had a role to play.

"It is essential for the public to gain a clearer, more detailed understanding of the roles played by the different systems involved and the necessary reviews to learn from this tragedy," Tay wrote.

Top image from Simon Khung's Instagram & MSF/Facebook