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A woman who was found dead in her South Auckland home with signs of strangulation had been in a volatile arranged marriage, with tensions rising out of the couple's inability to conceive children, authorities revealed today as her husband pleaded guilty to murder.
Beant Singh, 49, had been set to go to trial next month for the murder of Binderpal Kaur, who was 42 when she died in September 2020.
Singh, who has previously been on bail, instead stood before Justice Geoffrey Venning in the High Court at Auckland today with a suitcase in tow as he admitted to the crime through a Punjabi interpreter. He was immediately remanded into custody to await sentencing in September.
The couple had married 10 years earlier and began living together in New Zealand in 2013, according to an agreed summary of facts released to the Herald after the guilty plea.
"The killing occurred in the context of domestic problems, aggression, possessiveness, assertion of control, and violence from the defendant towards Ms Kaur," court documents state.
"They were unable to conceive any children, which was a source of tension in their relationship."
Shortly before her death, Kaur had told at least three relatives on separate occasions that she feared her husband would kill her in her sleep. She told a sister that she had been kicked and slapped by Singh and she showed a niece photographs of earlier injuries, which she said were at her husband's hands.
Beant Singh, left, pleads guilty in the High Court at Auckland to having murdered his wife in September 2020. Photo / Jason Oxenham
On the evening of Sunday, Sept 20, 2020, Singh arrived at a relative's home in what was described as a distressed state.
"[Kaur] has had a small attack, and that there is bleeding through her nose," the relative later recalled Singh telling him, adding that he believed Singh's wife had suffered a medical event of some sort.
Singh said he hadn't called an ambulance, so the relative decided to do so himself as the two drove to the couple's Papatoetoe home.
"They went inside and [the relative] saw Ms Kaur lying flat on her back in the lounge," court documents state. "She was positioned on the ground, between the sofa and coffee table.
"There was blood on Ms Kaur's face, around her nose. There was also blood staining on the sofa."
The relative tried to give CPR but was unsuccessful. She was pronounced dead at the scene a short time later.
A post-mortem exam showed that Kaur had died from neck compression. While the "precise mechanism through which the force was applied is unknown", the report noted "multiple findings" which are "frequently seen n deaths caused by manual strangulation".
Kaur had gone to work at a fast-food restaurant earlier that day and the couple had attended temple together that afternoon and had gone grocery shopping together. Authorities said the exact circumstances of what led to Kaur's murder remain unclear but it appears an argument ensued that evening after Kaur made a call home to India.
"However, Mr Singh, by his own admission, was the only person present at home with Ms Kaur at the time of her death," the agreed summary of facts state. "Accordingly, he was responsible for the assault that caused her death, even though its precise nature is unknown."
Singh was charged with murder and arrested several days after Kaur's death.
Justice Venning issued Singh a first-strike warning after the guilty plea. Kaur's family in India will have access via audio-visual link to the sentencing in September.
