Autistic boy's fall an accident

[Guest guest]

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%

2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_315884.html

Dec 18, 2008

Autistic boy's fall an accident

By Elena Chong, Courts Correspondent

A 14-YEAR-OLD austistic boy fell 12 floors to his death while trying

to dodge the police who had been trailing him from a coffeeshop early

one morning.

Yeo Wei Xiong was found dead at the ground floor of a block of flats

at Ang Mo Kio Street 61 on July 30.

According to an investigation report, the unemployed teen with

shoulder length hair had been seen hanging out alone at a nearby

coffeeshop past midnight on July 30.

When police arrived at the scene at around 1am, they asked Wei Xiong

where he lived.

But they had problems communicating with him as he had severe

speech/language delay and possibly a moderate cognitive delay.

Wei Xiong gave police an address which later turned out not to be his

home.

Eventually, he decided to walk home by himself.

One of the officers decided to trail him to make sure that he

returned home safely.

When the boy realised that he was being followed, he began to avoid

the officer by hiding in between pillars.

The officer lost sight of the teen and subsequently saw him near the

lifts of Block 646. He rushed forward and again lost sight of the

boy.

The officer noticed the lift had gone up to the 12th floor.

Wei Xiong's body was found at the ground floor of the block. He was

wearing a right yellow slipper with a blackcap nearby. The other

slipper was found wedged on a small opening of the parapet wall on

the 12th floor.

In recording a misadventure verdict on Thursday, State Coroner

Earnest Lau found that Wei Xiong, who had no suicidal intention, had

panicked and somehow fell to his death.

[Guest guest]

> Eventually, he decided to walk home by himself.

>

> One of the officers decided to trail him to make sure that he

> returned home safely.

>

Stupid intrusive intimidating thing to do. He must have wanted to make

Wei feel uncomfortable, as a piece of cultural disapproval of youth by

authority.

although we need more insight into why Wei gave a false address, and

whether it relates to his level of understanding of what was

happening, before we can know fully what hasppened.