Man jailed 14 years and caned for robbing and raping sex worker
SINGAPORE — He threatened the sex worker with a knife and took her money. Then, he forced her to perform a sex act on him and filmed it using his mobile phone before raping her.
On Monday (April 22), Chew Teng Wee, a 29-year-old forklift driver, was sentenced to 14 years’ jail and 24 strokes of the cane after he pleaded guilty to one charge of aggravated rape and one charge of robbery. Three other similar charges were taken into consideration for sentencing. The victim cannot be named to protect her identity.
The court heard that Chew first noticed the Vietnamese woman in May 2017 when she was working at a karaoke club in Jalan Besar.
He got her contact number from another of the club's employee and sent a text message to the woman, who was then 28, on social messaging application WeChat. However, the woman was not interested in him and blocked his number.
Three months later, he contacted her again and asked if she would have sex with him. The woman, who was also a freelance sex worker, did not recognise his voice and agreed to have sex with him for S$200.
They made plans to meet and Chew took her to his house. While they were in his room, the victim asked Chew to pay her first but he said he only had S$50 and offered to withdraw the remaining money after sex. She declined and refused to have sex with him until he had paid her in full.
Angered by her refusal, Chew took a 32cm-long knife from his cupboard and placed it against her neck. Petrified, the woman got on her knees and begged Chew not to kill her.
He then demanded that she hand over the S$200 cash in her bag.
Ignoring the woman’s pleas to spare her life, Chew asked her to have sex with him. Fearing that he would kill her, she agreed.
Chew then placed the knife back in the cupboard and made her perform a sex act on him. He used his mobile phone to take several photos and a video of her and he refused to delete the images and video when she asked him to do so.
After having sex with him, she asked Chew to let her leave but he refused.
She continued to plead with him by saying that she was hungry and he finally allowed her to leave at 3am and returned the S$200 to her.
However, he warned her that if she were to report the incident to the police, he would circulate the images and video on social media. Once again, he refused to delete them despite her pleas.
After she left, she told her friends about the incident. A passer-by who witnessed her crying as she was doing so reported it to the police.
In seeking a sentence of 15 years’ jail and 24 strokes of the cane, Deputy Public Prosecutor Gail Wong said that Chew had made the woman fearful for her life by placing the knife against her neck.
He had also caused psychological distress to the victim by filming her during the sex acts. There was some degree of premeditation in Chew’s actions because he had initiated contact with the woman before committing the offences and obtained her number from someone else.
For rape, Chew could have been jailed up to 20 years, fined or caned. For robbery by night, he could have been jailed up to 14 years and received up to 12 strokes of the cane.
