ABSTRACT
Singapore is a small but densely populated country, with a resident population of just over 5 million people. It is near the equator, located south of Malaysia in Southeast Asia, and although made up of more than 60 different islands, has a total land mass of only 272 mi2 (704 km2). Singapore is a relatively new country, which became independent only in 1965, when it separated from the Federation of Malaysia a‡er a long period of British rule. Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s senior minister and prime minister for more than 40 years following independence, developed a strong vision of how Singapore should be governed which has profoundly shaped not only the economic development of the country but also the current criminal justice system. According to Hor (2000) the major thrust of this policy was, for many years, “the progressive removal of ‘obstacles’ to conviction, severe punishment of the convicted, and where conviction is not possible, executive detention as a fallback” (p. 1). Nonetheless, the Singaporean criminal justice system has a strong British colonial legacy, and Singapore courts interpret the legal codes in much the same way as occurs in any system of common law.
