THE HONOR ROLL MURDER // STUART TAY'S SHATTERED LIFE //
Early on: smiles and success
DATE 01/15/93
NEWSPAPER THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
SECTION NEWS
EDITION MORNING
PAGE a01
STORY LENGTH 39 INCHES
HEADLINE THE HONOR ROLL MURDER // STUART TAY'S SHATTERED LIFE //
Early on: smiles and success
BYLINE/CREDIT Dan Froomkin:The Orange County Register
SUBJECT TERMS YOUTH:SHOOTINGS:MURDER:FAMILIES:REACTION:OC:ASIAN:IMMIGRA
TION
KEYWORD-HIT.
He is smiling in the baby photos. Smiling as a toddler on the
carousel. Smiling atop Mount Whitney with his Scout troop - the
all-American boy.
The portraits of Stuart Tay in his parent's custom-built, 11-room
home in Orange are the tableau of an immigrant success story.
Alfred and Linda Tay, Stuart's parents, left their native Singapore
in their teens, studied hard and worked hard. They got rich. They
tried to be good parents.
Their beautiful baby boy grew into a handsome young man with a mind
like a whip. An honor student.
But honors and a promising future proved to be no protection for
Stuart Tay on New Year's Eve. Just three weeks after his 17th
birthday, he was bludgeoned and choked to death in a murder that
has left many Orange County parents shaken and worried about their
own teen-agers.
The five boys charged with his murder are also high school
students. Three of them are affluent, honor-roll kids like Stuart
was.
And Stuart had been plotting with those five to steal computer
parts from a man with whom he had done business, police say.
It is bewildering. It is bizarre. Something went terribly wrong,
and everybody is trying to figure out what.
`HE WAS SO FULL OF LIFE'
Sitting in the cavernous living room of their canyon home, the
Tays talk and talk about their son. Most of the time, it's in the
present tense.
"He is expected to do well in school and go to college," said
Alfred Tay, 45.
"He's not your typical Asian boy," said Linda Tay, 44.
It has been 11 days since Stuart's corpse was unearthed from a
shallow grave in the muddy Buena Park back yard in which it was
dumped, wrapped in bloody sheets.
"I think I've accepted it, the fact that he's dead and gone,"
said Alfred Tay, a gynecologist. "But Stuart's memory will always
be around.
"I've caught myself calling my daughter `Stuart.' I'm sure I'll
do that many years from now."
There were no signs in Stuart's early years or his family
history that augured what was to come, his parents say.
Alfred and Linda Tay were both born in Singapore. Ethnically
Chinese, they were raised in a British colony with its own
traditions and with English as the primary language.
At age 18, Alfred Tay _ himself an honor student _ traveled to
Winnipeg, Canada, to enroll in college on a scholarship. He met
fellow student Linda there, and in 1972, when they were both in
their early 20s, they were married. They moved to Los Angeles so
Alfred Tay could take a post at LA County-USC Medical Center.
Stuart was born on Dec. 8, 1975, in Cedar Sinai Hospital in
Hollywood, where his father was a resident.
From the beginning, Stuart was an adorable and boisterous
American kid. At his memorial service Saturday, family friend
Colleen Tan recalled how, as a small child, he doggedly toddled
down a flight of steps to get where he wanted to go _ leaving his
parents with looks of "devotion, concern and a little
consternation" on their faces.
"He was so full of life," his mother said. "You could always
tell he was around."
When Stuart was 4, his parents had another child, a daughter
they named Candice.
AN ENTREPRENEUR AT AGE 5
They moved to Fullerton and Alfred Tay began what would become
a lucrative private practice in obstetrics and gynecology in
Anaheim.
When Stuart was 5 or 6, the first sign of his future interest in
commerce popped up. Stuart scooped tadpoles out of a pool in the
front yard and sold them to neighborhood children for 25 cents each
or three for a half dollar.
"We made him return the money," Alfred Tay recalled
good-naturedly. "We thought that was taking advantage of the kids."
And by first grade, Linda Tay said, Stuart already had adopted
the classroom style he would maintain through his high school years.
"His teacher told us, `Stuart asks all the questions, and then
he supplies all the answers, too.' "
TAYS TRIED NOT TO SPOIL SON
In 1987, when Stuart was 12, the family moved into an
8,000-square-foot house _ complete with four-car garage, seven
bathrooms, tennis court and swimming pool _ built for them in an
exclusive section of Orange.
Into his big, airy room, Stuart brought his Tonka toys. And he
brought Ben, the big brown teddy bear he had treasured since he was
a baby, and which he still dressed up in clothes like his own and
tucked in every night.
During the next few years, Stuart would go through "superactive"
phases of interest in certain subjects, his parents said. At one
point, he could identify any helicopter, plane or fighter jet by
name. Then he was crazy about skiing and would insist on being
allowed to pack all the family's skis when they took trips to Lake
Tahoe.
"Anything he went into, he went really into it," his mother said.
"Stuart was brought up an American child," explains his father.
At home the family spoke English. "He behaves as an American and
I'm proud of that."
While making it clear they had enough money to buy him anything
he needed, the Tays tried not to spoil their son.
He knew his parents had worked hard, and that he was expected to
do so as well. He was given chores around the house, such as taking
out the garbage and mowing the lawn.
By the time Stuart started at Foothill High School, everything
seemed to be going great guns. At school he excelled _ making the
honor roll, impressing teachers with his pointed questions, and
joining club after club.
Stuart's parents were sometimes anxious about their son's
future. But their greatest concern was that he would pick the wrong
career.
"Through the years, realizing that this child is very
intelligent, I told him he could do anything," Alfred Tay said.
"But somehow he got the impression that he should become a
physician.
"I tried to dissuade him, knowing the difficult life of the
physician. I tried to protect my own child from that life."
As it turned out, that was the least of his worries.
Dan Froomkin is a Register education reporter. Register reporters
Jeff Brody, Robert Chow, Jeff Collins, Donna Davis, Tony Saavedra
and Melissa Balmain Weiner contributed to this series.
THE HONOR ROLL MURDER
THIS IS THE FIRST INSTALLMENT OF A THREE-PART SERIES
SATURDAY - Trouble on the horizone
SUNDAY - Deadly acquaintances