Blood Lust (19 page)

Then there is the legal aspect, the broken
link in a chain of circumstantial evidence which at the trial was sufficient to
convict one of her lovers of murdering her. This is the side of the case which
fascinates me: I am prepared to accept a woman’s right to have lovers and, like
men, deliberately to select them. Why condemn a promiscuous woman because she
likes being loved by different men, and not equally blame men for sleeping with
different women? George Simonen, the famous writer of crime stories, claims to
have slept with 10,000 different women during an active sex life which spanned
nearly 70 years. Nobody condemned him!

Ideally, men and women should lead moral
lives, husbands and wives sleeping together, and with nobody else sampling the
joys of sex. This seems to be the attitude adopted by a writer in a Singapore
Chinese-language newspaper. A striking headline indicates what is to follow:

THROUGH LOVE SHE LIVES AGAIN …

THROUGH LUST SHE HAD TO DIE ...

SHE KNEW THE HAPPINESS OF HEAVEN

AND THE FRIGHTFULNESS OF HELL …

TWO LOVERS TWO DIFFERENT WORLDS

Jean was an enigmatic female who existed
in both spiritual and physical worlds. Though she wanted the most perfect kind
of love, at the same time she desired the pleasures of the flesh. And this
second best world which she pursued dominated after all. But like most ‘best’
things in life there was a price to be paid. Jean died, in her prime, in the
midst of love and lust. This was the case which stirred the emotions of
millions of people in Singapore and Malaysia. Jean’s beauty, style, and
seduction were moving, but yet more moving was the relationship between her and
her brother-in-law, and the sexual world which she inhabited rapturously with
her secret lover, the triangular affair which led eventually to her
cold-blooded murder.

The Jean Sinnappa case can be said to
have been the most exciting and torrid romance in the history of Malaysia.

Jean has been compared with Lady
Chatterley in Lawrence’s novel, but Jean was more passionate, more colourful
than the British noblewoman.

Jean Sinnappa was not only endowed with
natural beauty, her wealth and her flirtatious nature, made her very desirable
to men. Her own brother admitted that she was a woman of tremendous passion.
When she was chosen as beauty queen her voluptuous figure was displayed in
front of many men. She was truly unforgettable. She was uninhibited.

She married Sinnappa the civil servant.
Their marriage seemed to have been normally happy. But apparently, after they
were wed, Sinnappa soon discovered her overwhelming sexuality. Night after
night, when Sinnappa was unable to satisfy her sexual urge, he took to drink.
Jean started to wander, and the number of men interested in her multiplied.
Among them were her brother-in-law, Karthigesu (later to be accused of
murdering her) and the mysterious Sri Lankan doctor.

Unable to satisfy her, Sinnappa drove
himself further to the bottle. Shortly before he died he drank too much at a
dinner engagement and he died in a car crash. Thus Jean’s amorous nature can be
said to have resulted in a man’s death. This is the substance of tragedy.
Overnight Jean became a wealthy widow. With a fortune of half a million she
became even more notorious. Enamoured with her was the man who had stood in the
wings all along, quietly watching, Karthigesu.

To many, Karthigesu was a gentle, mild
and warm person. He would not hesitate to help any friend in trouble. He was
someone who wouldn’t harm a fly. How could he murder a woman? Thus, when he was
accused of being Jean’s murderer, the person who had plunged the knife with
such force into her breast, his friends refused to believe him possible of such
violence.

As for Jean, she was living with
Karthigesu. Yet simultaneously she was carrying on surreptitiously with the Sri
Lankan Doctor W. This enjoyment of the favours of both men aroused Karthigesu’s
rage.

At this stage the writer broke off to give a
Chinese traditional reaction to the relationship between brother-in-law and
sister-in-law. He wrote:

The Chinese observe much decorum in all
their relationships: the elder brother is looked upon as a father, and an elder
brother’s wife as a mother. Jean was Karthigesu’s sister-in-law, and although
they were not Chinese, there still ought to have been decorous distance between
a brother-in-law and sister-in-law.

The writer doesn’t hesitate to blame Jean
for this. He wrote that Jean didn’t even spare her own brother-in-law from her
lustful clutches. ‘What a sensual creature!’, the writer exclaimed, making no
comment at all on the behaviour of Karthigesu. Wasn’t he equally to blame?
Oddly enough the writer had decided that in this entire affair the villain of
the tale is the Sri Lankan Dr W. He wrote:

Born in Sri Lanka, he stayed there until
he graduated in medicine. He was a model husband to his wife Ira who could
never have imagined her husband capable of journeying to Kuala Lumpur to become
ensnared with Jean’s charms and wealth. The Doctor was Jean’s quarry, almost
wrecking his home and ruining his reputation. This was a lesson he will never
forget. Yet the writer spits on him!

   Strictly speaking Dr W. was not a
great lover. But the numerous times he spent with Jean in the YMCA had serious
repercussions, finally getting his lover slain. Not only did he not mourn her,
he demonstrated his cowardice by staying away from Kuala Lumpur after her
death. What a callous creature! Were Jean to know about it now, she would hate
this blackguard.

What intemperate language to use to describe
the behaviour of the hapless Dr W.! He sensibly stayed away from Kuala Lumpur
and the murder trial because his lawyers reasonably advised him that his presence
in Malaysia could not help in any way. Besides, it is hard to imagine that the
doctor did not mourn Jean secretly. The writer goes on:

Jean was not only beautiful, she was
naturally outstanding. In her youth she had already attracted the interest of
many men. When she appeared in society the men who lusted after her increased
in number. At school she was an average pupil, but she matured earlier than
other girls and her beauty and her arresting figure made her stand out from
others. Wherever she happened to be, there would always be men, swarming around
her, jostling for her affection. Her choice of Sinnappa was the beginning of
her tragedy. Sinnappa’s car crash came at a meaningful time of his life. He was
educated and led an active life. His marriage to Jean had produced three lovely
children. His premature death perpetuated this strange tragedy. His death
enabled Jean and Karthigesu to begin their romance, and her roving spirit lured
the amorous Dr W. into her bed.

Jean’s death has been described as a
most unusual case because nobody can truly determine who killed her. From time
immemorial men have longed to have a wholly devoted and faithful lady love.
Love cannot be shared. Thus when Jean refrained from committing herself wholly
to either man the tragedy began. Jean was stabbed in a car driven by
Karthigesu, and Karthigesu was found unconscious a short distance from the car.
From the wounds on her body Jean had put up a great struggle. She did not
intend willingly to die. Like a flower in full bloom, beautiful, admired by
many, Jean even in her wildest dream could not have envisaged that life would
be so brief. She was only 33 when she died.

Apart from Jean, no-one knows the
identity of the murderer, and there is no way Jean can satisfy the many curious
people who would like to know who killed her. However, surveying the entire
scene we can see that Jean loved Karthigesu deeply; they had already been
living together without legal rites. Jean’s little daughter regarded Karthigesu
as a father. Even when Sinnappa was alive, Karthigesu was like a foster father
to the children. As for Jean, she even kissed Karthigesu’s feet in much the
same way any Indian wife would treat her husband. If her Sri Lankan lover had
not suddenly emerged, Jean and Karthigesu would probably have tied the marital
knot long before.

After her death two sets of love
letters were found. These were Jean’s love letters to Dr W. and her letters to
Karthigesu. The first set shows the love which had developed between a young
widow and her unmarried brother-in-law. Those from her to Dr W. and Dr W’s
letter to her reveal their consuming passion. Were Jean an ordinary woman she
could have established a steady relationship with Karthigesu and spent the rest
of her days a happy and contented woman. Heaven, however, had given her the
role of a vain and lustful female from which she was unable to extricate
herself. From these letters it is obvious that Jean was a woman who really
enjoyed her sexuality. She was always admiring the powerful embraces and
presence of the virile male. Her Sri Lankan lover made use of this weakness of
hers to satisfy his own desires. Even when he was far away from her he found
her passionate letters very difficult to dismiss.

Jean looked towards the fulfilment of
desires of the flesh all her short life. In her letter to Karthigesu there is
this paragraph: ‘The weekend is over in a flash; but I always long for it to
arrive. I am happy just to see you and to hear your voice but it is hardly
enough. I feel that we are separated by an impenetrable wall, which prevents me
from touching you, to be clutched in your tight embrace, your lips, ever so
warm, pressing close to mine … ’

In another letter Jean sent this daring
wish to Karthigesu: ‘That night I really should have kissed you all over, used
baby oil to massage your whole body, then you would have no choice but to
respond, and you could take possession of me completely. Ah, my love, I think
of you every night … ’

Jean fantasized a lot about the male
body, easily forming an obsession … furthermore her sexy body made men wild.
Take her affair with the Sri Lankan: both seemed to ignite like dry firewood.
In the short span of between three and four months the doctor wrote Jean 19
bold love letters. In the very first letter the doctor wrote with passion: ‘We
may be separated, but our love is as tempestuous as a typhoon or a raging
inferno. My heart’s fire is ablaze. I am unable to expel you from my thoughts …
’

The doctor travelled from Kuala Lumpur
to Bangkok, not forgetting each time to tantalise her. From these vulgar love
letters it is apparent that Jean had always harboured fantasies about men. In
this way the flirtatious doctor began his affair with the widow, with
disastrous consequences. Jean’s whole life seems to have been controlled by
love, and it was for love that she had to die.

The doctor’s letters were passionate,
but terribly insincere. Because all his letters contained countless sexual
allusions, they could not be read out in Court. He posed as a great Romeo. He
did not however wish to abandon his wife and family: he wanted Jean to become
his mistress. One letter he sent to Jean admitted that he was a ‘weak’ lover.
He was reluctant to give up their affair, but he was afraid his wife would find
out. That was why in 8 out of 10 letters he begged Jean to keep the letters in
a safe place. One of the letters said: ‘I only wish you were in my bosom every
night, your gentle warm body, full of life, your wonderful figure fill me with
ecstasy. Do you know my love I want to embrace you with every ounce of my being
tonight, until we both drop off to sleep out of fatigue … ’

The doctor proposed to Jean on a false
pretext saying he could not live without her. On the other hand he was
apprehensive that society would not accept this sort of relationship.

Jean existed in the middle of two
lovers, one of whom she loved with deep passion, the other after whom she
lusted. Jean’s whole life was the pursuit of this sort of love and lust. In the
final analysis, her life was buried beneath the world of fleshly pleasure …

That is the conclusion one writer reached.
That is one way of looking at this tragic tale of love and murder. There is
another, equally as absorbing, and that is the strictly legal aspect of the
trial in which a case is made against the accused based entirely on
circumstantial evidence, a chain patiently built up and made credible enough to
cause a majority of the jurors to return a verdict of Guilty of Murder.
Sentenced to hang, Karthigesu appealed. Then it was that the chain of
circumstantial evidence broke when a witness admitted perjury. For that reason,
and for others concerning the admissibility of evidence, which the appeal
Judges ruled should never have been placed before the jury, Karthigesu was
freed. He was found ‘Not Guilty’ and acquitted.

Whichever way the case is looked at we are
left with the tantalizing question: Who did murder Jean Sinnappa? Why was she
murdered?