Student admits to taking compromising videos of teachers and friend
SINGAPORE — He took upskirt videos of two teachers while asking them questions about his school work.
The then-secondary school student, now 17, also took compromising videos of his sister’s friend while she was showering, threatened another girl for nude photos, and recorded a video of himself masturbating in front of a sleeping woman at a void deck.
On Wednesday (8 May), the teen, who passed his N Levels last year, was ordered to be assessed for probation and reformative training.
He admitted to five charges, including insulting the modesty of the two teachers and his sister’s friend, possessing an obscene object and criminal intimidation. Other charges of a similar nature, including taking an upskirt video of a student who was asleep in a bus, will be taken into consideration when he is sentenced.
Crimes began in 2017
In 2017, the teen uploaded a 15-year-old schoolmate’s underwear photographs onto an Instagram account. The teen, who was friends with the girl’s boyfriend, then messaged the girl, threatening to post the photographs online unless she sent him nude photos.
The girl informed her school’s discipline master of the incident and a police report was lodged.
The teen later transferred to another secondary school where he committed his offences against the two teachers. The reason behind the transfer was not revealed in court.
In early 2018, the teen took upskirt videos of his Mathematics and Mandarin teachers in by placing his phone on video recording mode on his school bag with the camera lens facing up.
The teen would then ask the teachers questions relating to his school work at his desk. His videos captured the teachers’ inner thighs and face. In total, the teen recorded seven compromising videos of the teachers.
Later that year, the teen preyed on his sister’s friend, who came to his house for a sleepover.
During the incident on 10 August, the teen placed his phone in video recording mode on the top shelf of his bathroom. His sister’s friend was recorded in the nude as she showered for some 10 minutes.
Earlier that same day, the teen filmed himself masturbating in front of a woman who was sleeping in the void deck of a flat. His acts were caught in two videos.
Caught only by chance
The teen was caught only by chance when police officers patrolling the void decks happened upon him and his peers behaving suspiciously at a void deck on 25 August last year.
Officers conducted a search on the teen and discovered the incriminating videos in his phone. The teen was arrested then.
At his plead guilty hearing, the teen’s lawyer, Rajan Supramaniam, urged for the teen to be granted probation as he had learned a “very harsh lesson in life”.
‘The (teen) is bought up in a traditional God-fearing Chinese family with values of honesty and hard work to succeed in life,” said Supramaniam in mitigation.
He added that the teen is currently waiting to be enlisted into National Service.
The teen will be sentenced at a later date after reports on his suitability for probation and reformative training are out.
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