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HE WAS sleeping in his room when he was woken by his wife's screams.
Still blurry-eyed from his afternoon nap, Mr Tan went to the kitchen where he had a rude shock.
Next to a messy pool of blood outside the kitchen toilet was their daughter, looking stunned.
His wife was frantic as she kept saying "baby, baby" while pointing at their 30-year-old daughter.
Mr Tan, 60, told The New Paper in Mandarin: "There was a lot of blood and I didn't know what my wife was trying to tell me.
"I looked into the toilet and almost fainted when I saw a baby lying face down on the floor."
He was not sure if it was dead or alive. But he said it did not make any sound.
The couple had no idea that their daughter was pregnant. And they have no clue who could have done this to her.
Mr Tan, a retired odd job worker, said that Mary, the older of their two daughters, was "a little slow" mentally, but her IQ has never been determined.
She went to a normal school, but dropped out a few days after she started Primary 6 because she could not catch up.
We are not using their real names to protect Mary's identity.
The family does not have a home phone and the prepaid card in Mr Tan's mobile phone had run out of money that day. So he rushed downstairs to the provision shop to call for an ambulance.
Recalling the incident which happened last Wednesday afternoon, Mr Tan said: "I didn't take a closer look at the baby.
"I was told later (by hospital staff) that it was a girl and that she was dead."
A Singapore Civil Defence Force spokesman said they had received a call at about 4pm.
On arrival, paramedics found that a woman had suffered a miscarriage at home. The mother and foetus were taken to the National University Hospital (NUH).
It is not known how many weeks old the foetus was.
It was dead by the time the ambulance reached the hospital.
Mary was hospitalised for a week and was discharged on Tuesday.
The next day, Mr Tan and Mary collected the foetus from the mortuary. Undertaker Roland Tay, who learnt of the family's plight, handled the cremation for free that afternoon.
When The New Paper visited Mr Tan at his four-room flat in the west on Wednesday evening, he was still traumatised and angry over the incident.
He said: "We didn't even know she was pregnant. We couldn't tell and if she didn't say, how would we know?
"It's no point asking her who the baby's father is. She doesn't know too. But the gods are watching. Whoever did this to her will get his retribution."
Mr Tan said that he and his wife had not spoken to Mary about sex.
Last Wednesday night, police officers went to the flat to question the family.
The New Paper understands that hospital staff had alerted the police after Mary was warded.
A police spokesman said that they are investigating the case.
In the past, a person who has sex with a mentally disabled person can be charged with rape as they are deemed to be incapable of giving consent.
After changes to the Penal Code in 2008, those who are mildly intellectually disabled and capable of giving consent were also protected.
It is now a crime to induce, threaten or deceive them into having sex, and offenders can be jailed up to 10 years and fined.
As Mr Tan spoke to this reporter, Mary, who stood beside him, would interrupt whenever she knew the answer to a question.
