Man who sexually abused niece, brother-in-law collapses in court after sentencing
A man molested his 17-year-old brother-in-law in 2011, and his 16-year-old niece in 2017 and 2018.
SINGAPORE — A 43-year-old technician specialist collapsed in a courtroom on Friday (June 19) after he was sentenced to three years and seven months’ jail, and nine strokes of the cane, for repeatedly molesting his niece and brother-in-law.
As he was sentenced, he cried and whimpered in the dock before passing out when District Judge Ong Luan Tze finished speaking.
Several security officers, who were about to lead him away, had to hold him up. He lay on the ground for at least five minutes afterwards.
He cannot be named because of a court order to protect his victims’ identities.
The Singaporean had earlier pleaded guilty to six charges of molestation, with seven similar charges — including insulting his niece’s modesty — considered for sentencing.
He had committed most of his offences against his niece from October 2017 to January 2018, when she was 16.
But the court heard that six years before, in 2011, he sexually assaulted his brother-in-law — then 17 — and performed a sex act on the boy.
THE RUSE OF A WORK PROJECT
The man first targeted his niece by asking her if she wanted to earn money. He lied that his company would pay her for running on the treadmill for 15 minutes.
After she accepted the offer, he picked her up from school and told her they were going to his flat for measurements and to collect samples from her.
When they got there, she complied with his request to remove her clothes.
He took various measurements of her body before touching her private parts under the guise of taking a sample.
He later advised her to be careful as he had seen “a few guys that are not ‘good boy’ type” around her flat, Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Tay Jia En told the court.
She told her close friends what had happened, and they prodded her to confide in her parents. She decided against it for fear that they would not believe her.
Even if they did, she was worried that they might think she had consented and scold her for being foolish.
On a second occasion in January 2018, he told her that he needed her to run on a treadmill for his work project again.
While they were on a public bus to his office, he forced her to masturbate him despite her repeated refusals.
Later that day, the man took her to a toilet for persons with disabilities, told her to strip and took her measurements.
He then used hand cream to massage her breasts for about five minutes, before further molesting her while filming the acts on his mobile phone.
They left the toilet and he took her to his office. Again, he coerced her into masturbating him before taking her to a nearby fast-food restaurant to have breakfast.
Court documents showed that he also filmed her showering in an unidentified changing room for employees.
On a separate day, he took her to a car park and molested her while they were in his car.
The girl made a police report at Ang Mo Kio South Neighbourhood Police Centre on Feb 22, 2018. Her uncle was arrested the next day.
The police referred her to Lakeside Family Services for counselling, where she confided that she felt betrayed by him. She also began harming herself, and experienced flashbacks and nightmares.
These episodes became less frequent after she underwent counselling, and she became more emotionally stable by May 2018.
GAVE HIS BROTHER-IN-LAW S$50
In 2011, the man used a similar modus operandi on his then-teenage brother-in-law.
At the time, the man was married to the teenage boy’s older sister and had two sons. It is not known if they are still married.
While they were in the man’s car in a multi-storey car park in Chua Chu Kang, he passed the boy S$50 and a pack of cigarettes.
He asked for a sperm sample before molesting the boy, saying he should not break his word and had already taken the money.
The boy reported the matter to the police only after learning what he had done to the other victim.
DPP Tay sought three years and seven months’ jail, and 10 strokes of the cane, saying the man’s conduct had “escalated” over the years and that he had shown a “huge, flagrant abuse of trust”.
The man’s lawyer, Mr Sukhmit Singh, asked for 17 months’ jail and two strokes of the cane instead.
Mr Singh produced a psychiatrist’s report, stating that his client had been sexually abused as a teenager and was suffering from persistent depressive disorder at the time of his offences.
But DPP Tay argued that the man had been inconsistent in his exchanges with his psychiatrist and another psychiatrist from the Institute of Mental Health.
District Judge Ong said that she had some reservations about the report from the man’s psychiatrist, as it was clear that he had given conflicting accounts or withheld certain information.
For each molestation charge, he could have been jailed up to two years, fined, caned, or received any combination of the penalties.
