[2] Tay, in his judgement, found that the death penalty was inappropriate given that the kidnappers did not harm the girl and treated her well during her confinement, save for the trauma she suffered and the verbal threat they made on her safety and life.
[3][4] Between 9 February 1987 to 18 January 2000, over a period of 13 years, Singapore Airlines cabin crew supervisor Teo Cheng Kiat misappropriated an approximate sum of S$35 million from his company.
On 30 June 2000, High Court judicial commissioner Tay Yong Kwang found Teo guilty of ten charges of criminal breach of trust and sentenced him to 24 years in prison.
[5][6] On 14 May 2001, 34-year-old Anthony Ler Wee Teang hired a 15-year-old youth to assassinate his wife, 30-year-old Annie Leong Wai Mun, who was in the midst of divorcing him, so that he can become the sole owner of their flat and himself gain custody of their then-4-year-old daughter.
Within the next 13 months, six of the gang members involved were arrested and eventually sentenced to jail and caning for culpable homicide, rioting and voluntarily causing grievous hurt, while the remaining two assailants were never caught till today.
One of these gang members, 22-year-old Muhamad Hasik bin Sahar, stood trial before JC Tay Yong Kwang in the High Court on 9 May 2002.
In his words, JC Tay reiterated in his judgement: Those who feel victorious in being vicious and who have no qualms about the annual celebration of one's birth culminating in the untimely death of another will have to spend all subsequent birthdays within prison walls until such time as they are eligible for parole.
On 24 May 2002, Tay presided the trial of Peh Thian Hui, a 48-year-old housing agent charged with raping the daughter of his lover, who had consented to these sexual assaults and also participated in the obsence acts personally.
In his written grounds of decision on sentence, Tay harshly criticised the couple for the aggravated rape of the girl, who was not named to protect her identity.
He cited that the mother had failed in her duty by allowing her boyfriend to commit the rapes on her own child, and it defied all notions of motherhood for her to be a bystander and abettor of the sexual abuse her daughter went through.
[15] In April 2004, Judicial Commissioner Tay Yong Kwang, who upgraded as a High Court judge the year before, would sentence 44-year-old Chia Teck Leng, a compulsive gambler and finance manager from Asia Pacific Breweries (APB), to a total of 42 years' imprisonment for Singapore's then biggest case of commercial fraud after convicting him of 14 out of 46 charges of criminal breach of trust, citing that the $117 million he swindled out of four foreign banks was "enough to feed many people for life".
[16][17][18] In September 2004, Tay presided over the trial of two businessmen, Chua Ser Lien and Tan Ping Koon, both charged with kidnapping a seven-year-old girl for ransom on Christmas Day 2003.
[21] Another case was 50-year-old Leong Siew Chor, who strangled his 22-year-old lover Liu Hong Mei to death and cut up her body into seven pieces before disposing them at the Kallang River.
He stated that Liu, who was young and intending to pursue a polytechnic diploma in tourism, excited to attend her sister's wedding etc., would not have any reason to commit suicide.
Despite putting up a defence that he was drunk and he fired the gun accidentally and did it in self-defence when Lim tried to use a chair to attack him (which is not possible since Lim's hands was also tied up at that time before his death), Justice Tay Yong Kwang rejected his defence, calling his actions were of “assured and accomplished assassin”, and called his story of accidental shooting a laughable fantasy, since it required strength to pull the trigger.
As an aftermath of the incident (including Tan's execution), Ho Yueh Keong, who went on the run for 9 years before his arrest in Kuala Lumpur in July 2015, was sent to jail for 20 months for helping Tan escape Singapore,[24] and Lim Choon Chwee was also imprisoned for 6 months for failing to report a robbery after receiving a discharge not amounting to an acquittal for abetment of murder.
By the time Lee was extradited back to Singapore for trial, his two accomplices were already dealt in court in 1998 for their respective roles; one of them, Ng Chek Siong, was sentenced to jail for eight years with ten strokes of the cane on robbery charges,[26] and the second robber, Too Yin Cheong, was found guilty of murdering the professor by then-Judicial Commissioner Chan Seng Onn and he was hanged on 30 April 1999.
[27][28][29][30] During the trial, Tay determined that Lee had strangled the victim with the view of silencing him and avoid leaving him alive as a potential witness to report the robbery to the police, and therefore he should be convicted of murder and sentenced to hang.
[32][33] In 2007, Tay heard the case of three robbers charged with murdering a lorry driver Wan Cheon Kem during a robbery heist in May 2006.
Tay determined that Balakrishnan had intentionally inflicting the fatal injuries on Wan during the robbery, and thus his actions were equivalent to an offence of murder under Section 300(c) of the Penal Code.
On 4 October 2010, Daniel and Christopher were each sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment and 15 strokes of the cane, after Tay considered the brutality of the attack and their respective roles in the robbery.
[36] On 2 September 2007, 20-year-old National Serviceman Dave Teo Ming sparked a 20-hour-long nationwide manhunt when he went AWOL, with a SAR-21 assault rifle, eight rounds of ammunition and a knife.
In his words, he said to Teo: 'My heart hurts for you that so young a man will have to spend some of the best years of his life in prison and have to undergo so many strokes of the cane, but I trust that you understand a deterrent sentence is unavoidable in the circumstances.
[38][39] On 3 March 2009, Tay made legal history when he sentenced a 48-year-old cleaner, Bala Kuppusamy, to 42 years of imprisonment and 24 strokes of the cane, which was then the longest jail term ever meted out for a sexual crime within Singapore's jurisdiction.
[40] Tay Yong Kwang was the judge who heard the case relating to the death of 19-year-old Republic Polytechnic student Darren Ng Wei Jie.
[45] On 20 May 2016, more than 8 years after Cao Ruyin's murder, 32-year-old Kho Jabing was hanged in the gallows after a final reunion and farewell with his family from Sarawak.