S'porean, 29, who ran over & killed cyclist who stole backpack in Australia, jailed 5 years & 9 months

A 29-year-old Singaporean man convicted of manslaughter in Australia after running over a 48-year-old cyclist who stole a backpack has been sentenced to five years and nine months in prison.

According to a judgment by the Supreme Court of Western Australia, Lincoln Ng Jing Kai was in Perth on holiday with his girlfriend and her family.

He had planned to propose to his girlfriend during the trip.

The group had rented a car for their travels, from which the cyclist, Mark John Burnes, stole a backpack.

Ng spotted Burnes the following day and gave chase in the car.

The pursuit ended in Burnes' death after Ng accelerated hard, mistakenly believing that the car's transmission was in reverse, and ran him over.

Judge Terence Palmer said Ng's actions involved a "degree of vigilantism", although he acknowledged that Ng had not intended to seriously injure Burnes.

Ng was initially charged with murder and pleaded not guilty.

However, he later pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter in August.

Victim stole backpack

The court heard that Burnes had stolen the backpack belonging to Ng's girlfriend's brother on the night of May 23, 2024.

The family had gone into a restaurant for dinner and had left some belongings in the boot of the rented car.

The backpack contained the brother's passport, iPad, some cash and an AirTag tracker.

Seeing this, Burnes called his partner of his intentions to steal the backpack.

He then smashed the back window of the car,  left with the stolen backpack and returned to the room he shared with his partner.

They discovered the AirTag and threw it into the tray of a car parked outside.

The family later returned to the car and found that it had been broken into.

They reported it to the police and noted the AirTag's location.

Tracked the Airtag

The following day, the family received another car from the rental company and drove to the location where the AirTag was last detected: a construction site.

They also phoned the non-emergency police line to request police attendance at 1:35pm.

As the family searched the construction site for the AirTag, Burnes rode past on an e-bike carrying what appeared to be the stolen backpack, the court heard.

Ng's girlfriend's father told him to follow Burnes so that they did not lose sight of him.

Ng was in the driver's seat, his girlfriend in the front passenger seat, while the rest of the family were in the rear.

Fatal pursuit

The court heard that Ng pursued Burnes for approximately 10 minutes around various streets in Carlisle.

His girlfriend's brother stayed on the phone during this time, updating police on Burnes's location.

As Burnes rode down Lion Street and approached the corner of Lion Street and Jupiter Street, he left the road and mounted the grassed verge outside Lion Street.

At this point, someone from the back of that car told Ng to give his e-bike a "tap".

He then drove the car onto the verge and connected with the rear wheel of Burnes's e-bike, causing him to come off the

e-bike and fall onto the verge.

Ng continued forward and stopped on Jupiter Street before making a U-turn to face Burnes.

Burnes had stood up on the grassed verge and had picked up his e-bike, while yelling threats at the family.

Audio recording captured him yelling: "what the fu*k", "you're a dog" and "you're dead".

Scared that he might attack the car, Ng tried to reverse away from him.

He stepped down hard on the accelerator, thinking the car's transmission was still in reverse, but it was in drive.

The car struck Burnes on the grassed verge, who fell to the ground and went under the vehicle, which continued to drive off the verge and onto Lion Street.

Burnes became trapped under the front driver's wheel as Ng continued to drive approximately 25m up Lion Street, dragging Burnes under the car for that distance.

Some bystanders later ran over and yelled at the car to stop or banged on the driver's window.

Eventually, Ng stopped the car, then reversed it, releasing Burnes from underneath the vehicle.

Ng later told the police that he did not know that someone was trapped under the car.

Died from injuries

The police and paramedics later arrived just before 2pm and found Burnes lying on the roadway.

He was taken to the hospital and pronounced dead at 2:42pm.

Burnes died as a result of multiple injuries sustained during the incident, including multiple bilateral rib fractures, lacerations and haemorrhages to the lungs, and bleeding inside the chest.

Ng was arrested at the scene.

He admitted to pursuing Burnes and deliberately hitting him so that he would fall off his bike, saying it was only a "very light tap" to cause him to fall to buy time for police to arrive.

Judgment

In handing down the sentence, the judge accepted that Ng believed the victim posed an imminent threat to the group and that he had made a "split-second decision" under pressure.

However, he noted that using the car to pursue and confront Burnes involved "very poor decision-making".

He added that attempting to manoeuvre a large vehicle near someone on an e-bike during a tense confrontation was "very dangerous".

The judge further noted that the decision to pursue and confront Burnes involved an "element of taking the law into your own hands" and a "degree of vigilantism".

Meanwhile, Burnes' father delivered a victim impact statement, saying that the loss had had a "devastating impact" on his entire family, including his three children.

The court also heard that Ng had written an apology letter in which he took full responsibility for his actions and their impact on the victim's family.

In considering Ng's upbringing and education, the judge noted that he came from a tight-knit, middle-class family and had held various leadership positions throughout his schooling. He had also excelled in several subjects.

Ng had no criminal record in either Australia or Singapore.

The judge also took into account Ng's cultural background and the fact that his potential father-in-law had been directing his actions, which provided some context for his offending.

"It is important to note, however, that your life is one characterised by a capacity for leadership. Leadership was called for on that fateful day. It is a tragedy that you were a follower and not a leader that day."

Ng was ultimately jailed for five years and nine months, backdated to his arrest on May 24, 2024.

He will be eligible for parole after three years and nine months from May, 24, 2024.