Probation for male student who fixed spy pen in toilet to film female schoolmates
SINGAPORE — A male student who fixed a spy pen to a female toilet cubicle door in his secondary school with the intention of filming girls illicitly was given a one-and-a-half-year probation on Wednesday (12 January).
The 17-year-old boy had intended to retrieve the pen later, but a female student spotted it and handed it over to the school's vice-principal.
Apart from probation, the boy will have to keep to a time curfew, perform 40 hours of community service, and attend programmes for his sexual offending. His parents were also placed on a $5,000 bond to ensure his good behaviour.
The boy will also be banned from using a mobile phone with image-capturing function, unless he obtains permission from his probation officer.
He had earlier pleaded guilty to two counts of voyeurism and one count of distributing voyeuristic images, after he sent an upskirt video and two screenshots from the video to another classmate.
A charge of trespassing into the female toilet, and another of filming his domestic helper illicitly in his house, were taken into consideration for his sentencing.
As he was under 18 at the time of the offences, the male student cannot be named as his identity is protected under the Children and Young Persons Act. A gag order also prohibits the naming of the victims in this case.
Filmed upskirt videos since 2019
Since 2019, the boy had filmed a few upskirt videos of female strangers at MRT stations with his mobile phone. He would also film females while standing behind them on ascending escalators.
He had sent an upskirt video and two screenshots from one of his videos to his classmate.
On 19 August 2020, at about 1.15pm, the boy entered the female toilet on the third floor of his school, and used double-sided tape to stick a black pen containing a pinhole camera onto the top of a cubicle door.
He angled the camera towards the toilet bowl, intending to record female schoolmates in their private acts, and planned to retrieve the pen the next day.
Later that day, a female student entered the cubicle to use the toilet and the pen recorded her in the act.
As the victim was about to exit the cubicle, she noticed that the pen and found it odd. Upon taking a closer look, she saw that there was an SD card embedded on the pen, which had a pinhole camera. The victim removed the pen and handed it to one of the vice-principals of the school.
The school's discipline master lodged a police report on 21 August.
Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore
