One morning in July 1991, Zai was pacing up and down the living room, peering through the window every 5 minutes. She was anxious. After a hard discussion with her husband, she finally agreed to employ a domestic helper to take care of their 2¼ years old child. Zai had been burned out for the past year juggling between house work and taking care of their toddler. Her husband thought a domestic helper will provide Zai the much needed breathing space. The day had finally come as Zai anxiously waiting for the maid to be delivered to her house.
A little bit after 9am, a white Toyota Corolla pulled in her driveway. It was Zai’s friend Jauyah. Jauyah played a big part in Zai’s decision to agree with getting a domestic helper. She had been coaxing Zai about how beneficial it would be for Zai to get a maid and assuring her that it was hassle free and she would deliver the maid in no time. And deliver the maid in no time she did. What Zai didn’t know at that time was that “the maid” is the cousin of Jauyah’s maid. This cousin had already arrived in Brunei and living in Jauyah’s house in Telisai eager to follow her cousin’s footstep to earn money to be sent to her poor family in the Philippines. Jauyah had been contacting several people, Zai included, persuading them to get a domestic helper and she could help in getting and delivering one.
Out the car with Jauyah was the domestic helper, wearing worn out shirt and skirt, flip flops, a worn out duffle bag on her shoulder. It was not hard to tell that this woman had a tough life. As they reached the door, Jauyah introduced them, “Shirley, this is Zai. You will be working with her from now on”. With her head down, Shirley said “Good Morning maam”. Zai pointed to the room by the kitchen and said “you can put your bag in there”. Shirley nodded her head, smiled and said “Thank you maam”, but just stood there. Then Jauyah said “Oh by the way, Shirley doesn’t speak any Malay or English”. It turned out that Good Morning and Thank You are the only English words that she knew. But Jauyah assured Zai that Shirley will learn the language “in no time”. Apart from Shirley being 30 years old, had experience working in a dressmaking shop and nannying a child back in the Philippines, and oh yeah speaks no English or Malay, Jauyah didn’t offer much more information on this maid to Zai. Still speechless with the revelation about the language barrier, with the dumbfounded look on her face, Zai watched Jauyah got in her car and left. It was too late for her to change her mind now…
How to train someone who doesn’t speak your language? There was no goggle translate back in the 1990s. But Zai just had to suck it up and put in the effort. Despite her best efforts and a lot of patience, Zai became increasingly frustrated when even after a month, Shirley still didn’t pick up any English, let alone Malay. By the second month, things remained the same, reaching the point where Zai began to think that Shirley was comfortable with not being able to understand her instructions as a way to dodge doing some tasks. The third month came and Zai thought that she had tolerated enough. Having the domestic helper didn’t give her the benefits that she initially expect, instead had given her more stress than she already had. So Zai made a decision, agreed by her husband, to terminate Shirley’s employment. She asked Shirley to pack up her things and called Jauyah to come and pick Shirley up. Not wanting to hurt Shirley’s feeling, Zai told Jauyah that the decision was not because Shirley wasn’t a good domestic helper, it was just that there was no chemistry between Shirley and her child, hence not a good fit. Seeing Shirley with her head down in Jauyah’s car as she was driven away, Zai felt a bit of guilt and sympathy. Little did she know at that time how life-altering that the decision would be.
Shirley was devastated. She feared that Jauyah was going to send her back to the Philippines where she had to face the people who lent her the money to get to Brunei. She had been sending her salary back to the Philippines to pay out the debt. She feared that if the monthly payment stop, the lenders will go after and hurt her family. She feared about the safety of her 7-year-old son. Her cousin Helena conveyed this concern to Jauyah who sympathised with Shirley’s plight. At the same time, Jauyah knew that it would be hard to get Shirley a new employer given the language barrier. So, Jauyah made a fateful decision to send Shirley to work for her sister, Gauyah, a decision that she would later regret tremendously.
On 08 October 1991, just 2 days after Jauyah picked Shirley up from Zai’s house, Jauyah sent Shirley to Gauyah’s house at Kg Sg Basong, Tutong. Jauyah convinced Gauyah that Shirley is good and Gauyah took her word for it. She thought that she could use some help to look after her 18-months old son. Before she left, Jauyah explained to Shirley about her tasks. Shirley nodded her head repeatedly, not that she understood anything though, she was just happy that she got to stay being employed in Brunei and not sent back to the Philippines.
The following day, 09 October 1991, Gauyah and her husband, Daus woke up early as in any other weekday to get their two other kids ready for school and for themselves to get ready for work. At 7.15am, Daus left to send the two kids to school nearby. Then he came back to the house to pick up Gauyah to send her to work with Shirley and the toddler tagging along. Gauyah works at the Tutong hospital less than a minute away from their house. After dropping off Gauyah at the hospital, they went to pick up Jauyah and brought her back to their house to supervise and further brief Shirley on her tasks. Before leaving for work, Daud said that he will be back at 9.50am to bring Shirley to meet her cousin, Helena as Shirley had requested. On his way out, a carpenter, Bakar arrived to repair a cabinet in the master bedroom.
Now left in the house with the toddler were Shirley, a domestic helper who they just met the day before, the carpenter and Jauyah. Gauyah and Daus drew comfort from the fact that Jauyah would be there to ensure the safety of their toddler in the presence of the two “strangers” in the house.
However, in a lapse of judgment, Jauyah left the house.
Bakar was in the master bedroom doing his thing with the cabinet. At some point he heard clanging sounds coming from the kitchen, but he didn’t put much thought to it. He stayed focus on fixing the cabinet. Around 9.40 Bakar felt hungry and went out of the room to get something to bite. Nothing prepared him for what he would see outside.
Bakar saw Shirley, her clothes full of blood, cradling the toddler in her arms, walking from the kitchen right past him towards the main door. The toddler was covered in blood, no sound, not moving. He saw a bloody butcher knife and blood on the kitchen floor. Bakar asked “What happened??” but Shirley didn’t say anything. She just walked out the door and calmly sat on a rattan chair on the porch still holding the bloody toddler. Bakar panicked and sprinted to the nearby Land Transport Department to call the police. There was no cell phone yet in 1991.
After calling the police, Bakar bumped into the unsuspected Daud who was on his way back to the house to pick up Shirley for her meeting with Helena. Bakar told Daud that the maid had done something to the toddler. Daud arrived at the house just as the police arrived at the scene. Neighbours and onlookers have already congregated watching in horror at this woman with bloody clothes sitting quietly on the rattan chair at the porch of the house holding the bloody toddler with a blank look on her face staring off into space.
Daud immediately grabbed the toddler, and as soon as he did that, Shirley snapped out of her daze and started to scream hysterically. The police arrested Shirley. Daud rushed the toddler to the hospital where unfortunately the toddler was pronounced dead.
Autopsy report showed that the toddler had seven cut wounds in the neck and four on the hands. Two deep wounds in the neck caused the death. The bloody butcher knife, Shirley’s and the toddler’s bloody clothes were all sent for forensic analysis, where it was determined that Shirley had indeed murdered the toddler. But, why did she do it? What was the motive?
News about the horrific incident quickly spread to the country’s public, not as quick as today though. The words that went around were that this crazy amah sitting on the front steps nonchalantly sembalih a baby with a knife in clear sight for everyone to see. Although this version of event was not accurate, one thing the rumour got right, that the amah is indeed “crazy”.
When asked why she did it, Shirley said that on that morning, she heard voices telling her to “do it”. When asked to do what, she answered “to kill the cat”. She took a knife from the kitchen and killed the “cat” by chopping it on the kitchen floor. The two mental experts who evaluated Shirley, including one flown in from Manila, said in their reports that Shirley has mental illness and was experiencing a psychotic episode the morning when she killed the toddler.
The killing of an innocent baby by a psycho domestic helper shook the nation to the core. In particular, fear swept through families who have domestic helpers in their homes, questioning if their maids have undiagnosed mental illness and could have a psychotic episode anytime. It is not something that can be found in their resume when selecting one. Even the details in the resume are not necessarily all true. So, practically it is a gamble. When Zai learned about the murder, her face turned pale, her knees felt weak, she slumped down on the floor in shock, “that could’ve been my baby”, she thought in her mind. When news about it reached the Philippines, the lady whose child was once being nannied by Shirley also had the same emotional reaction – it could have been her child too. Looking back, it dawned on them that there were actually some peculiar things which they didn’t pick up as red flags, as they recalled catching Shirley talking, laughing and crying to herself.
While admitting to killing the “cat”, at her trial Shirley pleaded not guilty of murdering the toddler by reason of insanity (How to get away with murder 101). The two doctors who evaluated her vouched for her insanity stating that “when she committed the crime she was mentally ill, psychotic, and not aware of what she was doing. She was suffering from psychosis of the schizophrenic type”. Well, we all know where this is heading, as far as getting justice is concerned.
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