what happened to victor chang

Dr Victor Chang, a pioneering heart surgeon in Australia, was murdered in Sydney on 4 July 1991 during a failed extortion attempt; he was shot twice in the head by assailants who had targeted him for money.

Who was Victor Chang?

• Chinese‑born Australian cardiac surgeon, born 21 November 1936.

• Helped establish the National Cardiac Transplant Unit at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney and became a leader in heart and heart–lung transplantation.

• Played a key role in developing an artificial heart valve widely used in Asia.

• Appointed Companion of the Order of Australia in 1986 for his contributions to medical science and international relations.

What happened to him?

• On the morning of 4 July 1991, while driving to work in Sydney, his car was deliberately rammed to force him to pull over.

• The plan was to extort money from him; when he refused to hand over cash, one of the men shot him twice in the head at close range, killing him at age 54.

• The killing shocked Australia and is widely described as one of the country’s most notorious murders.

Who killed Victor Chang?

• The primary assailants were Malaysian men Chew Seng (Ah Sung) Liew and Choon Tee (Phillip) Lim, who had selected Chang after seeing him in a magazine profile of successful Asians in Australia.

• They surveilled him, then staged the traffic collision as part of an attempted kidnapping and extortion scheme.

• A third man, Stanley Ng, was involved in planning but pulled out the day before the killing and later gave evidence in exchange for immunity.

Investigation and trial

• Initial suspicion briefly focused on possible organized‑crime involvement, but investigators concluded the crime was an amateur extortion attempt.

• Liew pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced to 26 years in prison, with a non‑parole period of 20 years.

• Lim was convicted and sentenced to between 18 and 24 years, having claimed he did not know Liew had a gun.

• After around 21 years in prison, Liew was granted parole in 2012 and deported to Malaysia shortly afterward.

Legacy and what followed

• Chang received a state funeral, reflecting his status and the public shock at his death.

• In 1984 he had founded the Victor Chang Foundation, which continues to support education and innovation in cardiology and cardiothoracic surgery.

• In 1994 the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute was established in Sydney to research prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of heart disease.

• In 1999 he was posthumously named “Australian of the Century” at the People’s Choice Awards, underscoring his enduring reputation.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.