Teacher creates fake social media profiles to talk to teens about sex, sends victims obscene material

SINGAPORE: A secondary school teacher who derived sexual pleasure from talking to others about their sexual experiences decided to set up two fake social media profiles to do so.

Pretending to be a female or a male teenager, Tay Tong Wei deceived six victims - most of whom were in their teens - into having sexual conversations with him.  

Tay, 36, also sent them obscene videos or photos, claiming that they were of himself.  

Tay pleaded guilty to seven charges of distributing an obscene film or photo electronically, and instigating a female victim to send a compromising video of herself. Another 40 charges of a similar nature will be considered when he is sentenced. 

At the time of the offences, Tay was a teacher at a secondary school. He is now a private tutor. 

The six victims - three female and three male - were aged between 15 and 20 at the time of the offences. All cannot be named to protect their identity. 

The court heard that in 2013 or 2014, Tay found that he derived sexual pleasure from chatting with others about their sexual experiences. He set up two fake social media profiles to do so.

One was a Facebook profile of a woman called Jasmin, the other came in the form of Facebook and Snapchat profiles of a young man known as "Mikey Cool" or Mike. 

He began chatting with a then 17-year-old female victim as Jasmin in November 2015. Jasmin began broaching sexual topics with the victim, who grew comfortable with the subject as she believed Jasmin was a girl of her own age.

Jasmin then introduced the victim to Mike - who was also the accused - and the two soon began chatting about sex.

The victim openly shared her sexual experiences, and Tay would send her photos and videos of individuals engaging in sexual acts. He declared that one of the videos involved Jasmin having sex with her boyfriend. 

Between 2015 and 2016, Mike offered to buy the victim a sex toy and left it on a bench near the victim's house. The victim retrieved it. 

In 2017, after befriending another then 19-year-old girl on Facebook, Tay, pretending to be Jasmin, sought advice for sexual matters from the victim, whom she called "elder sister". 

"Jasmin told (the victim) that she had recently gotten together with her boyfriend, and asked (the victim) how to sexually satisfy her boyfriend," Deputy Public Prosecutor Sheldon Lim told the court. 

The victim, believing she was talking to a younger girl, gave her advice and related her own sexual experiences. Jasmin asked for videos of the victim and her boyfriend having sex, but the victim declined to send these.

Instead, the victim agreed to send her nude photograph after Jasmin sent a photo of a nude woman, purportedly herself. 

To a then 15-year-old male victim whom he befriended via Facebook in January 2016, Tay presented himself as Jasmin and began having explicit conversations with him. 

"From 2016 up until June of 2019, (the victim) and Jasmin chatted about various sexual topics. (The victim) would tell Jasmin about the sexual acts that he wanted to perform on her, and Jasmin would respond by telling (the victim) about the sexual acts that she wanted to perform on him," court documents stated. 

Tay did the same to another male victim, then 17, whom he befriended through Facebook in 2016.

Tay will return to court for sentencing on Oct 30. 

For transmitting obscene material, he faces a jail term of up to three months, or a fine, or both.