SINGAPORE — Usually cheerful, boatman Ong Hock Long was a changed person in the weeks leading up to his death, becoming quiet and uncommunicative. 

One colleague who noticed the change in mood assumed he was preoccupied by debts amounting to over S$30,000. To another colleague, Ong claimed to have cancer and said it was better to die.

His strange behaviour continued on the day of his death, but whether Ong, a Singapore River Cruise employee, had drowned from a suicide attempt or a state of “drug-induced psychosis” will remain an unsolved mystery, with State Coroner Marvin Bay on Monday (Feb 27) declaring an open verdict on his death.

Prior to setting his bumboat ablaze and jumping into the river on July 12 last year, Ong, 32, cryptically told a colleague on the same boat that he could not pick up passengers at Clarke Quay as there was “someone there”, and headed towards Boat Quay instead. He also instructed her to jump onto a passing boat, and subsequently collided into Elgin Bridge across the Singapore River twice.

Following this, he gathered the life vests on his bumboat in the passenger compartment and set them ablaze with a lighter. As the vessel went up in smoke, Ong was spotted to be on fire as he jumped into the river. 

His body was found floating face-up in the waters off Esplanade Theatre at 10.45pm the next day, with traces of alcohol, amphetamine and methamphetamine in his blood. 

While he accepted fire investigators’ suggestion that Ong had set the blaze deliberately, Coroner Bay was unable to establish the reasons for doing so. 

It was impossible to predict Ong’s psychological state accurately from his toxicity report, as he was a known drug abuser who had been admitted to a rehabilitation centre in 2010 and 2011, and could have developed a tolerance towards drugs.  

Evidence showed that Ong had been in a “deeply troubled mental state” in the hours prior to his death, possibly due to his financial woes, compounded by the neurological effects of drug abuse, said the coroner.  

Ong had borrowed money from colleagues and family members, and had ended a romantic relationship in the few months before his death. These could have made him depressed and prompted him to end his life, noted Mr Bay.

But he had also shown signs of “disturbing delusions” — a known side effect of methamphetamine abuse. These were apparent in at least two instances: When he said in a frustrated manner that he could not go to Clarke Quay as someone was there, and when he lied about his cancer diagnosis.  

Ong had also called his mother about an hour-and-a-half before committing arson. Over the phone, he asked his mother to cook his share of dinner that night. 

Given the circumstances, the evidence did not “irresistibly” lead to the conclusion that Ong had committed suicide, despite him deliberately setting the life vests on fire. 

Coroner Bay said: “Where the possibility was that Mr Ong might have been motivated by a transient state of drug-induced psychosis to commit acts which were likely to endanger his life, without actually intending to commit suicide, it would only be appropriate for me to record an open verdict in this case.”