Er Kok Yong (Yu Guorong) and another v Tan Cheng Cheng (Cheng Qingqing) (As Co-Administratrix of the Estate of Spencer Tuppani) and others

Spencer Tuppani died on 10 July 2017 after being stabbed by his father-in-law. Among the assets in his sole name was a shophouse at 31A Lorong Mambong, bought from two sellers in 2017 with a Maybank mortgage taken out in his name. His friends Er Kok Yong (Jason) and Lim Soon Hwa Lawrence, who had set up several businesses with him, sued the three co-administratrixes of his estate (his widow Shyller, her sister-in-law and his former wife) in Suit No 554 of 2021, claiming a one-third beneficial share each in the property. The suit was tried with a separate suit over a BMW in which the estate counterclaimed against Jason.

The plaintiffs said the three men had orally agreed in late 2016 to buy the property for S$4.8m as equal owners, with title in Spencer's name, and that each of them had contributed S$535,200, partly from S$99,000 each they said Spencer was already holding from a failed watch franchise venture. In early May 2017 Spencer asked his lawyer to prepare a trust deed declaring that he held two-thirds of the property for the plaintiffs, but by his death only Lawrence had signed it. The plaintiffs relied on a common intention constructive trust and, alternatively, a purchase money resulting trust. The estate denied any such agreement and any contributions. The judge dismissed the claim after trial and gave these grounds after the plaintiffs appealed.

1. Whether the plaintiffs proved direct financial contributions to the purchase price giving rise to a resulting trust in their favour
2. Whether the plaintiffs and Spencer shared an express or inferred common intention that each would hold a one-third beneficial share
3. Whether an adverse inference should be drawn from the plaintiffs' deletion of their WhatsApp group chat

Applying Chan Yuen Lan v See Fong Mun, the court began with the alleged contributions and found the evidence riddled with inconsistencies and unexplained gaps. Even on the plaintiffs' own figures, their claimed payments could not support a one-third share each, because the balance came from a mortgage in Spencer's name and there was no agreement at purchase about who would repay it; neither plaintiff knew the instalment or the rent, and neither paid anything towards the shortfall after Spencer died. The individual payments also failed: a cheque Jason relied on was made out to Lawrence's company, a bank withdrawal did not match the sum claimed, there was no evidence of the S$99,000 cash, Lawrence produced no bank statements, two cashier's orders he relied on had been bought by the lawyer with his own funds, and his cash paid to the law firm was held in Spencer's client account on Spencer's instructions rather than as conveyancing money.

On common intention, Spencer told his lawyer in December 2016 that he alone was buying, and the request for a trust deed came only on 2 May 2017, in WhatsApp messages about a likely divorce and a dispute over assets, saying he could show Shyller the property was "theirs not mine". The court found the deed was meant for that purpose, which explained why Spencer and Jason never signed it. The report on title to Maybank disclosed no trust. The plaintiffs' account of choosing Spencer's name for loan-servicing reasons collapsed under Jason's cross-examination and was described as a pack of lies. Statements Shyller was said to have made after the death could not show an intention formed before the purchase, and other witnesses' accounts of what Spencer said were hearsay and given no weight.

The plaintiffs' accounts of the deleted group chat, which they accepted would have recorded the purchase discussions and the S$99,000 payments, shifted from changing phones to feeling sad, and the timing made no sense. The court drew an adverse inference under s 116, Illustration (g) of the Evidence Act. On costs, the defendants' figure of $180,000 assumed a full trial that had been shared with the other suit, and the plaintiffs' $113,000 was too low.

The High Court dismissed Suit 554, holding that neither a resulting trust nor a common intention constructive trust was proved, and ordered the plaintiffs to pay the defendants' costs, later fixed at $135,000 plus disbursements of $5,199.07.