Teen fatally struck by van only checked one side of traffic

Before she crossed the road, Ms Dorothy Naomi Tan had checked for oncoming traffic, but only for vehicles coming from her left.

As she crossed, a van travelling from her right hit her.

Ms Tan, 19, who was about to start law school, died of her injuries a day later.

On Jan 23, a coroner’s inquiry opened into Ms Tan’s death in the traffic accident, which happened at around 8am on June 8, 2024, at Joo Chiat Road.

Ms Tan’s parents, lawyer Mr Bernard Tan and his wife Mdm Tan Chin Shin, were in court with Mr Tan’s elder brother.

Station Inspector (SI) Jeff Tan, a Traffic Police (TP) investigation officer, told the court the accident happened on a two-way road near the Rising Court apartment building.

The van driver, lab technician Mr Woo Jie Yu, 24, was on his way to release Wolbachia mosquitoes in the area.

While driving along Joo Chiat Road, he noticed Ms Tan standing on the footpath with her head facing the opposite direction.

Video footage retrieved from Rising Court showed Ms Tan looking at traffic coming from the lane opposite her, for about eight seconds.

SI Tan said she did not check for traffic coming from the lane closer to her - which was where Mr Woo was on.

As Mr Woo approached the carpark entrance of Rising Court, SI Tan said Ms Tan dashed across the road.

Mr Woo tried to swerve to the right and brake, but hit Ms Tan. She was flung a distance onto the opposite lane.

When the van swerved, it also collided with a power-assisted bicycle (PAB) rider on the opposite lane.

But the PAB rider left the scene and did not leave any contact details, and the police were unable to track the rider down, said SI Tan.

Mr Woo stopped his van and called for an ambulance and the police. Ms Tan was conveyed unconscious to Changi General Hospital.

Before the accident, she had been in Beijing, China on a family trip but returned early to attend church activities.

Her family flew back immediately after receiving a call from the hospital about the accident.

It told them her brain no longer had any activity and further treatment would be futile.

After seeing Ms Tan for the last time, her family decided to remove her from life support. She died on June 9, 2024, at around 1.40am.

Her cause of death was certified as head injury. She had sustained multiple injuries including a severe traumatic brain injury, fractures and lacerations.

During the inquiry, Mr Daniel Goh, a lawyer representing the family, asked why SI Tan said Ms Tan had “dashed” across the road.

Said Mr Goh: “She took perhaps one step, a very sad step, but it’s not tantamount to dashing across (the road).”

SI Tan replied that from TP’s investigations, Ms Tan’s step onto the road felt like a running motion.

State Coroner Adam Nakhoda halted the exchange and said he would draw his own conclusions after reviewing the evidence.

Mr Goh also asked about the van’s speed and noted the speed limit of the area was 50 km/h.

SI Tan said he did not know, but could put in a request for the authorities to analyse the van’s speed. He added he was unable to tell via the video footage if the van was travelling below the area’s speed limit.

In previous media reports, Mdm Tan had said her daughter wanted to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a lawyer.

Ms Tan, a former student of Raffles Girls’ School, had been accepted into the Yong Pung How School of Law at Singapore Management University, and was about to start school when the accident happened.

Mdm Tan told local Chinese paper Shin Min Daily News the family has forgiven the driver, and would accept any judgment made by the authorities. 

State Coroner Nakhoda will announce his findings on Jan 27.