(Main text) The map shows the location at which the 24 people were picked up. Imagine the manpower involved in this island-wide raid. Every arrest was carried out by a team of at least five officers in two unmarked vehicles. Every one of those arrested had been trailed for at least 24 hours before their arrest by at least 10 plain- clothe officers. When the detainees arrived at the Whitley Road Detention Centre, every detainee was interrogated by two teams of at least four ISD officers each for 24 hours per day, with senior officers storming in and out of these interrogation rooms, shouting and assaulting detainees and a legion of ISD researchers and writers cooking up the 41-page press release and other terrifying stories. Whitley Road Detention Centre must have seen the largest concentration of police superintendents, deputy superintendents and inspectors deployed for the operation.
(text in orange boxes in clockwise direction)
While the entire nation was entertained by the live telecast of the first-ever-held Miss Universe contest in Singapore late into the night of 20 May 1987, the secret police had been hard at work from dawn. Hound-like ISD agents fanned out all over the island, trailing 16 peaceful, unarmed people to arrest them in the early hours of 21 May 1987. It was the “shock and awe” tactic – loud and continuous bangings on doors in the still of the night, waking up the dead, shocking all and sundry into a paralysis. Handcuffed and blindfolded, the 16 were escorted to the Whitley Road Detention Centre.
On 19 June 1987, Nur Effendy was arrested while doing his National Service at Pulau Tekong. It was his 3rd day in National Service.
On May 6 1988, Francis Seow, lawyer acting for Teo Soh Lung, was himself arrested at the Whitley Detention Centre where he was scheduled to meet his client.
On 19 April 1988, Kevin de Souza was arrested while carrying out his legal work at the Subordinate Courts. Ironically he was detained without trial at this august institution for justice.
Patrick Seong was arrested outside a clinic at People’s Park Complex where he had just completed his dental checkup.
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