Public Prosecutor v Chee Soon Juan and Another

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Kaur Jasvender
• Judgment Date: 21 May 2008
• Neutral Citation: [2008] SGDC 131
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Year: 2008
• Published date: 08 July 2008
• Plaintiff Counsel: Lim Tse Haw and Wendy Yap Peng Hoon (Deputy Public Prosecutors)
• Defendant Counsel: Both defendants in person
• Citation: [2008] SGDC 131

21 May 2008

District Judge Jasvender Kaur:

1 The first defendant Dr Chee Soon Juan (‘Chee’) is charged with the provision of public entertainment without a licence under s. 19(1)(a) of the Public Entertainments and Meetings Act (Cap 257) (“PEMA”). The second defendant Mr Yap Keng Ho (‘Yap’) is also charged with providing public entertainment without a licence, also under s. 19(1)(a) of PEMA. The amended charge against Chee alleges that he gave an address on 8 April 2006 at about 3.54pm at the open space between Causeway Point and Woodlands MRT Station, Singapore, without a licence issued under PEMA. The amended charge against Yap alleges that he gave an address on 8 April 2006 at about 4.08pm at the open space between Causeway Point and Woodlands MRT Station, Singapore, without a licence issued under PEMA.

2 As both Chee and Yap were accused of committing the offences in the same transaction, the prosecution applied to proceed against them at a joint trial. Both defendants did not object to the application. As the application of the prosecution was proper, I ordered a joint trial.

3 The prosecution called eight witnesses in support of its case. The salient aspects of the witnesses evidence is summarised below.

Evidence for the prosecution

(i) Evidence of PW1 – Loh Zhen Hong (“Loh”)

4 Loh was a police corporal attached to Sembawang NPC at the material time. He left the Singapore Police Force in February 2007.

5 He testified that on 8 April 2006 he was off-duty. At about 2pm, he left his home at Woodlands Avenue 9 to meet his girlfriend at her house at Bukit Panjang. He took a feeder bus to Woodlands Interchange. Upon arriving at the Interchange at about 2.30pm, he went out of the Interchange to purchase a copy of the Newpaper from a shop near the control room of the Woodlands MRT Station.

6 At the open space between the Woodlands MRT Station and Causeway Point building and facing the direction of the shops adjacent to the MRT Station, Loh saw a Singapore Democratic Party (‘SDP’) member, whom he identified to be Yap, making a speech with a microphone and amplified with a portable speaker. He also noticed SDP members giving out newspapers, banners displayed with the words ‘Singapore Democratic Party’ and its logo and makeshift tables. He was shown a set of four photographs and he pointed out the area where the activity was conducted to be in the centre of photograph marked ‘A3’ for identification (later admitted as P6) near to the Malay lady dressed in blue and wearing a tudung. He was shown a sketch plan of the scene (later admitted as P10) and he confirmed that the sketch plan was consistent with what he observed.

7 After making observations for about 30 seconds to one minute, Loh decided to call the police to check if there was a permit for the activity. He went to the basement of the bus interchange and made the call at 2.36pm to Woodlands NPC and gave the message “members of the Singapore Democratic is giving out speech and papers. [Require] police to check” (see exh. P1). Thereafter he took a bus from the Interchange to his girlfriend’s house.

8 Under cross-examination by Yap, he said he did not count the number of SDP members present. He recalled seeing about four to six of them. He agreed that he believed it was unlikely that the activity had a permit. He disagreed he was instructed to check on the activity and to make a police report. Asked if he thought the newsletters were being given out free, he replied he only saw the newsletters being given to members of the public and he did not know if any payment was made.

9 Under cross-examination by Chee, he said his real concern was that a SDP member was making a speech amplified by a speaker and the display of banners. He was unable to recall what he heard Yap saying. Asked if he had seen hawkers selling things using a microphone in public, he said that he had not.

(ii) Evidence of PW2 - Soon Fook Kong (“SIO Soon”)

10 SIO Soon was a police officer with the Jurong Police Division HQ holding the rank of Station Inspector at the material time. He left the Singapore Police Force on 25 November 2007.

11 On 8 April 2006, he was on 24-hour duty as a senior investigation officer (“SIO”) at Jurong Police Division from 6am until 6am the following day. He was on duty with two other officers – Assistant Investigation Officer (“AIO”) Inspector Jason Lim Chun Cheng (Insp. Jason) and another investigation officer.

12 At about 3pm, whilst SIO Soon was outside the station, he was informed by the Divisional Operations Room of a report of “members of the SDP is giving a speech and selling papers” at Causeway Point. He was directed to attend to the case.

13 SIO Soon requested the Divisional Operations Room to activate the duty scene of crime officer, Staff Sergeant (‘SSgt’) Lam Tien Chiang (‘SSgt Lam’). SIO Soon also called SSgt Lam and informed him that he would meet him at Causeway Point. SIO Soon left for the scene with Insp. Jason.

14 At 3.55pm, SIO Soon and Insp. Jason arrived at the scene in a marked police car. They then parted company. SIO Soon tried to locate SSgt Lam. He spotted him in the crowd and observed he had begun video filming. As such, SIO Soon did not approach him. SIO Soon then started to make his own observations. He marked the position where he kept observations from as “PW2” in the sketch plan marked P2.

15 He noticed a crowd of about 80 persons gathered at the open space between Causeway Point Shopping Centre and Woodlands MRT Station, and Chee was addressing the crowd in English using a microphone which was amplified by a speaker. He noticed there were makeshift tables and banners behind Chee, and that the tables were being manned by persons dressed in a similar attire of dark blue polo T-shirts and khaki pants as Chee. All in all, SIO Soon noticed 11 persons attired similarly, with five or six of them manning the tables and the others mingling with the crowd.

16 Asked to show in the photographs where he saw Chee giving his speech, SIO Soon said it was at the area between the four lampposts in photograph A3 (later admitted as exh. P6). SIO Soon was also referred to the sketch plan, and he stated that it was in accordance with his observations.

17 SIO Soon testified that after Chee spoke in English, he went onto speak in Mandarin. Asked if he was able to remember what Chee was addressing the crowd on, he stated he could recall briefly that he made a comparison of the salaries of Singapore’s ministers with the salary of the President of the United States; the NKF (National Kidney Foundation) saga and its ex-CEO; the transport fare hikes; and asked for support from the crowd for the upcoming elections.

18 After speaking for about 15 minutes, Chee passed the microphone to Yap who then started to address the crowd in Cantonese. SIO Soon stated that he does not understand Cantonese. After speaking in Cantonese for a “very short moment”, Yap continued speaking in Mandarin for a few minutes. SIO Soon was unable to recall what Yap said in Mandarin. Thereafter, Yap handed the microphone back to Chee who then continued addressing the crowd. After a short while, Chee stopped, and the group packed up and left. SIO Soon believed the group left as it was starting to rain.

19 He estimated the entire duration that he was there until the group dispersed to be around 25 minutes. After the SDP had packed up at about 4.20pm and the crowd had dispersed, SIO Soon met up with SSgt Lam. He directed him to take photographs of the scene. He was in the vicinity when the photographs were taken but he did not see SSgt Lam taking the photographs. He also asked SSgt Lam to put up a sketch plan of the scene.

20 At about 5pm, SIO Soon left the scene with Insp. Jason for Jurong Police Division Hq. SSgt Lam left in a separate vehicle. At Jurong Police Division Hq, SSgt Lam handed the cassette tape of the recording that he had made to SIO Soon. The cassette tape was marked ‘C’ for identification. SIO Soon eventually handed over the cassette tape to ASP Jeremy Koh.

21 Under cross-examination by Yap, SIO Soon confirmed that he did not make any attempt to stop the activity. He explained that he noticed a big crowd and his priority was to ensure there was no disorderly conduct. He added that the activity did not last for a very long period of time as the group dispersed. Asked if he assumed that there was no licence for the activity, he replied that he did not know if there was a licence issued. Asked why the activities were filmed and photographs taken, he said it was part of the collation of evidence and if at the end of the day there was in fact a licence there would not have been any issue.

22 With respect to the video-recording, he was asked if he saw himself or any other police officer in the video. SIO Soon replied, “Not that I recognise”. When the video was played, SIO Soon agreed that he was the person in light blue shirt talking on a handphone with his back to the video at 16.14.36 s. He agreed that he had a newspaper with him, as seen in the video. However, he was unable to remember which newspaper it was. Asked if it was necessary for him to obtain a copy of ‘The New Democrat’ for his investigations, he said it was not. It was put to him that he was holding a copy of ‘The New Democrat’ and he replied that he was unable to remember.

23 With respect to the photograph marked ‘A1’ (later admitted as P4) in which the MRT clock shows the time to be about 3.45pm (see enlarged photograph marked P8), SIO Soon was asked to explain why the time was about 3.45pm when on his evidence he had directed photographs to be taken after the SDP members had left the scene at about 4.20pm. SIO Soon replied he was unable to explain as he had directed SSgt Lam to take photographs after the SDP members had left.

24 A copy of the ‘The New Democrat’ newsletter ‘2006 Issue No.1’ was shown to him and he was asked if it was similar to the copy he saw on 8 April 2006. SIO Soon stated...