Woman, 34, starts fire outside ex-colleague’s Bukit Batok home thinking she was avoiding her but she was overseas

A 34-year-old woman lit a fire outside her ex-colleague’s HDB flat in Bukit Batok.

She was frustrated as she assumed her ex-colleague was home and ignoring her.

Tong Huanling, a Chinese national, has since been fined S$3,000.

Started a fire

According to court documents seen by Mothership, Tong Huanling went to visit her former colleague on Jan. 29, 2026, sometime between 9pm and 10pm at her home at Bukit Batok Street 21.

She intended to serve her court papers.

However, Tong was unaware that her former colleague was overseas, leaving her husband and daughter at home.

Tong knocked on the door but received no response, so she waited outside for about an hour, reported Shin Min Daily News.

During that time, she saw the lights in the flat turn on.

She knocked again and rang the doorbell, but there was still no response.

She came to believe that her ex-colleague was deliberately avoiding her.

Frustrated, Tong took a cardboard box with joss paper from the void deck and used a lighter she borrowed from a stranger to set it on fire near her ex-colleague’s gate at about 11pm.

She then took a picture of the fire and sent it to her former colleague.

Tong knocked on the door again before kicking a chair in anger, which fell onto the box and caused the fire to spread.

Her former colleague’s husband saw the blaze and smoke through the door’s peephole, and he called the police.

Police

The police arrived at about 11:10pm. Two neighbours had helped to extinguish the fire before that.

Tong was sitting on a stool near the flat and admitted to the police that she had started the fire to get her ex-colleague’s attention.

The wooden chair that was damaged in the incident was worth S$25.

During sentencing, Tong’s lawyer reportedly pleaded for leniency on the grounds that Tong had sought psychiatric help.

She was diagnosed with adjustment disorder and is receiving treatment.

Furthermore, the court heard that she had tried to offer compensation and apologised multiple times, but was rejected.

The prosecution argued that despite only causing S$25 in damages, the fire posed a significant safety risk as it had spread in a residential area.

The prosecution sought a fine between S$3,000 and S$4,000, reasoning that Tong admitted to her charges, had no criminal record, and tried to compensate the victims.

Tong was fined S$3,000 by the judge, taking into account her days in remand and early guilty plea.