Public Prosecutor v Chang Boon Hiok Benedict
| Jurisdiction | Singapore |
| Judge | Toh Han Li |
| Judgment Date | 31 January 2022 |
| Neutral Citation | [2022] SGMC 10 |
| Court | District Court (Singapore) |
| Docket Number | MAC-910295-2019 & Ors, Magistrate’s Appeal No 9252-2021-01 |
| Year | 2022 |
| Published date | 09 February 2022 |
| Hearing Date | 26 January 2021,23 July 2020,08 December 2020,15 June 2021,21 July 2020,24 September 2021,14 June 2021,03 November 2021,27 January 2021,25 January 2021,30 August 2021,27 July 2020,07 December 2020 |
| Plaintiff Counsel | DPP Foong Ke Hui and DPP Haniza Abnass (Attorney-General's Chambers) |
| Defendant Counsel | Mr Peter Keith Fernando (Leo Fernando LLC) |
| Subject Matter | Criminal Law,Outraging of modesty,Criminal Procedure and Sentencing,Sentencing |
| Citation | [2022] SGMC 10 |
The accused claimed trial to the following charge:
MAC-910297-2019 (“3 rd Charge”)You…are charged that you, on 28 March 2019, on or about 12.00am, at [address], Singapore, being a member of the household of the employer of [V], Female, 27-years-old, a domestic helper, did use criminal force on [V], to wit, by touching [V’s] left breast over her shirt with your fingers, knowing it likely that you would there by outrage [V’s] modesty, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 354(1) of the Penal Code, Chapter 224 (“PC”), read with Section 73(2) of the PC.
He was tried at the same trial for two other charges of outraging modesty (MAC 910295 and 910296 of 2019) against the same victim on 8 March 2019 (the 1
At the end of the trial, I acquitted the accused of the 1
The accused is on bail pending the appeal.
For the purposes of the Grounds of Decision, I focused on the accused’s appeal against his conviction and sentence on the 3
The victim was a foreign domestic worker at the material time. She arrived in Singapore on 14 April 2017 and was employed by the accused’s wife (“DW2”) from 27 April 2017 to 29 March 2019. Her gross salary was $638 per month of which $22 was deducted for a day off.
On 3 March 2019, DW2 applied to extend the victim’s work permit and the victim’s work permit was extended from 3 April 2019 to 3 May 2019. The other members of the household were D, E (“DW4”) and M who were sons of the accused and DW2. Their ages at the material time were 16, 12 and 9 years old respectively. Since May/June 2018, the victim would share a room with M, as set out in photographs P2 to P6. This was referred to as the “Yellow Room” in the sketch plan of the unit in D1. The victim and M would sleep on mattresses separated by a laundry basket in the Yellow Room. The “Blue Room” as referred to in D1 was occupied by D.
The alleged incidents took place towards the tail end of the victim’s employment, namely on 8 March 2019 for the 1
The victim had a good relationship with all members of the accused’s family although there was some suggestion by the defence of a possible motive on the victim’s part to falsely implicate the accused arising out of specific events. I will discuss this in due course.
The prosecution’s evidence on the 3On 27 March 2019 at around 11.30pm the victim was asleep with M in the Yellow Room with the lights off. She was lying face up on the mattress and wearing a T-shirt. Her mattress was closer to the wardrobe as depicted in P5 and her head was further away from the door and was closer to the right side of the picture in P5 with her feet closer to the door. M’s mattress was placed beside the victim’s mattress and was away from the wardrobe and closer to the window that is depicted in P2. There was a space of roughly more than one arm’s length between the victim and M’s mattress. The room door was open. The victim testified that since she had started working for the accused and DW2, they did not allow her to close the room door. She did not cover herself with a blanket.
The victim testified that she was in a deep sleep when she felt someone touching her left breast for a few seconds in a circular motion over her T shirt. That person was seated on the floor between her mattress and M’s mattress. She pushed the person’s hand away and saw someone leaving the room. At that moment, she saw the time on her phone and it was midnight. The wall clock in the room stated 12.05am which meant that the date would be 28 March 2019. She did not go back to sleep as she was scared. She wanted to send a message to DW2 but did not do so as she did not want to disturb DW2 who she thought was sleeping. The victim said that she was scared that the incident might happen again.
The victim’s testified that she did not see the face of the person who touched her but recognised the physique as that of the accused. She surmised by the process of elimination that it was the accused as D was fat, DW4 was skinny and M was asleep next to her and it was not the accused’s wife DW2. The relevant portion of the victim’s evidence under cross-examination was as follows1:
Under cross-examination, the victim testified that she did not see the accused picking up M’s pillow under M’s head, adjusting his bolster or placing it between his legs and turning M to the side and tapping him. At about 2.00am she was awake and heard someone open the flat gate and saw D come in.
On the morning of 28 March 2019, she performed her household chores. She was teaching M spelling in the Blue Room who was also watching television. DW4 kept disturbing M and taking away the television remote control. DW4 pushed the victim and she pushed DW4 back. She then went to check on her cooking in the kitchen. DW4 was angry that he could not come into the room as he wanted his mass clothes (referring to clothing for the Catholic mass service). DW4 asked the victim why she did not prepare his mass clothes. The victim then told DW4 that his mass clothes was hanging at the window. DW4 changed into them and left.
On the evening of 28 March 2019 at 8.41pm, the victim texted DW2 asking her if she could close the [room] door. DW2 came into the victim’s room and asked her why she wanted to close the door. The victim said that someone came into her room and disturbed her. The victim told DW2 that she was not sure who came into the room to touch her although she said it was not D. She did not tell DW2 that it was the accused as she was scared that DW2 would get angry, confront the accused and the accused may get violent. The victim also recalled DW2 asking her if the accused had touched her on the Saturday mornings when they went marketing and the victim said no.
DW2 asked D if he had gone into the victim’s room and he said no. DW2 asked the accused if he had gone into the victim’s room and he said “yes” as he wanted to check on M. At that point, the mother of the accused asked the victim to calm down with words to the effect of asking the victim not to “make the incident big” to the extent that they needed to go to court.
The accused told the victim that she could close the door to the room that evening.
The accused spoke to DW2 and his mother in a language that the victim did not understand. The victim testified that she was scared as she did not know what they were planning for her and that they may send her home early.
On 29 March 2019 she spoke to her cousin (“PW3”) over the phone about the incident and told her that she was going to lodge a police report. PW3 testified that the victim had messaged her that she had a problem and told her that her boss had held her breast. When they spoke on the phone, PW3 testified that the victim was crying said that she was scared for the victim. The victim explained that she did not know the process in Singapore about making a police report and PW3 was scared that the victim might go to jail.
On the same morning, as DW4 had forgotten to bring a file to school, the victim took the file with her and passed it to DW4 in school. The victim sent text message (P8) at around 9.17am to DW2 which stated:
Mam I thought I will be very happy going back..
I respect you and sir,,,I treat you as a family ..as the way you treat me..
I’m very sad..
Thereafter, at around 10.00 am, she went to Serangoon Neighbourhood Police Centre and lodged a police report (P1) where she stated:
On 08/02/2019 and 28/03/2019, at the said location, I was touched by my male employer.
The victim testified that she had decided to lodge a police report as she was still staying with the accused and she was scared that “things might happen” if she did not lodge a police report. At the police station, she sent PW3 a text message stating that she was at the police station.
PW3 testified that that she subsequently met the victim in April 2019 and asked her if she was alright. The victim said that she was depressed and PW3 testified that she could see this from the victim’s face. PW3 noticed that the victim’s eyes were swollen from crying and she had lost a lot of weight.
PW4 was the Myanmar maid who worked for the accused’s neighbour. She testified that the victim had told her face to face on one occasion and on another occasion texted her to say that her employer had touched her. At the face to face meeting the victim had demonstrated to PW4 how she had been touched. PW4 demonstrated this in court by touching her shoulders and her breast. PW4 estimated that the time span between the two face to face meetings was a few days but she was not very sure of this.
The victim testified that during the December school holidays in 2018 she had accompanied the accused and his family on a trip to China. DW2 had arranged that the victim should pay for her own air ticket to China. DW2 asked the victim if was going to China and she said that she did not want to go as she did...
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