Public Prosecutor v Chua Kok Thye

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Christopher Tan Pheng Wee
• Judgment Date: 20 June 2019
• Neutral Citation: [2019] SGDC 125
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: DAC 918563/2018 & Ors
• Published date: 07 December 2019
• Year: 2019
• Hearing Date: 22 May 2019
• Plaintiff Counsel: Dwayne Lum & Lim Woon Yee (Deputy Public Prosecutors)
• Defendant Counsel: Eugene Thuraisingam
• Citation: [2019] SGDC 125

District Judge Christopher Tan Pheng Wee: Introduction

The Accused is a 49-year-old male. He pleaded guilty to the two charges below and was sentenced as follows:

	Proceeded Charge	Offence	Sentence imposed
1	DAC 918563/2018 Acting as a member of an unlawful society	Section 14(3) Societies Act1	Imprisonment: 2 weeks
2	MAC 902522/2016 Using abusive words towards a public servant in the execution of his duty	Section 6(3) Protection from Harassment Act2	Fine: $5,0003

He is appealing against the sentences imposed.

The Accused also consented to two other charges against him being taken into consideration (“TiC”) for the purpose of sentencing:

	TiC Charge	Offence
1	DAC 918561/2018 Being a member of an unlawful society, for the years 1984-1990	Section 14(3) Societies Act
2	DAC 918565/2018 Committing an affray	Section 267B Penal Code4

Facts

The Accused is a 49-year-old male Singaporean. He is a former member of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society, of the ‘18’ Group, operating at Farrer Park Market (Singapore). This is an unlawful society as it is not registered under the Societies Act. The Accused was recruited by the society in 1984 as a ‘fighter’ and remained as a member until 1990. His past membership forms the subject of the TiC charge under s 14(3) of the Societies Act.

On 16 August 2017, the Accused committed an affray by fighting with one Tan Wei Liang. This forms the subject of the TiC charge for affray (“the Affray Charge”). The Accused was arrested and released on bail for this offence. While on bail, he went on to commit the offences detailed below.

On 2 February 2018, at about 11.45 pm, a team of officers from the Criminal Investigation Department’s Secret Societies Branch (“SSB”) conducted enforcement rounds at various locations. Assistant Superintendent of Police Diong Kok Leong (“ASP Diong”) was part of this team. At about 1.15 am,⁵ the team arrived at Club Nexus (“the Club”), located on the third floor of Oriental Plaza. The team was tasked to conduct checks on the patrons there.

The Accused, who was the owner of a car workshop at the time, was in the Club drinking alcohol with his business partners and friends. He was repeatedly shouting the slogan “Yo Ah Yo”, knowing that this is a chant of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society. ASP Diong thus approached the Accused, identified himself as a SSB officer and asked the Accused to follow him. The Accused refused to comply with ASP Diong’s directions and started to behave aggressively. A few SSB officers came over and assisted in arresting the Accused for an offence under s 14(3) of the Societies Act. The Accused put up a violent struggle.

Eventually, the Accused was restrained and escorted out of the Club and towards the police vehicle. Whilst being escorted out, the Accused uttered expletives in the Hokkien language, directed at ASP Diong’s mother. The Accused did this repeatedly, despite ASP Diong warning him to stop. The Accused’s vulgarities form the subject of the charge under s 6(3) of the Protection from Harassment Act (“the Harassment Charge”). The Harassment charge reads:

you, on 3rd February 2018 at or about 1.15am, at Club Nexus in Oriental Plaza, located at 291 New Bridge Road, Singapore, did use abusive words towards one Diong Kok Leong, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) of the Singapore Police Force, who is a public servant, in relation to the execution of his duty as such public servant, to wit, by uttering the words “Na Bei Chee Bye” in Hokkien dialect, which meant “Your mother’s cunt” in English at the said public servant, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 6(3) of the Protection from Harassment Act, Chapter 256A.

After the Accused was brought to the police vehicle, he continued behaving in an aggressive manner towards ASP Diong and the other SSB officers. He identified himself as ‘Marlboro’, declaring that he was a gang member of the “Sio Gi Ho” secret society of the ‘18’ group and that he was not afraid of any police officers. The Accused also continued to utter the abovementioned Hokkien expletives at ASP Diong.

The Accused’s two acts of: shouting “Yo Ah Yo” (this being a slogan of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society); and identifying himself to ASP Diong as a member of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society, form the subject of the charge under s 14(3) of the Societies Act (“the Societies Act Charge”) which the Prosecution proceeded with. The Societies Act charge reads:

you, on 3rd February 2018, at or about 1.15am, at Club Nexus located at No. 291 New Bridge Road, Oriental Plaza, Singapore, had acted as a member of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ Secret Society of the ‘18’ Group, an unlawful society, to wit, - by shouting ‘Yo Ah Yo’, the gang slogan of the said unlawful society, and - by identifying yourself as a member of the said unlawful society to Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Diong Kok Leong,

and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under section 14(3) of the Societies Act, Chapter 311

Antecedents

The Accused was convicted in December 1994 for disorderly behaviour, under s 20 of the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act⁶ (“MO(PON)A”). For that, he was fined $600.

The Societies Act Charge

The relevant portion of s 14(3) of the Societies Act is set out below:

Any person who - is or - acts as

a member of an unlawful society… shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $5,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 years or to both. [emphasis added]

The membership prohibition in s 14(3) thus has two limbs: ⁷ the prohibition against being a member; and the prohibition against acting as a member. In this case, the Societies Act Charge which the Prosecution proceeded with pertains to the second limb, i.e. “acting as” a member.⁸

Insofar as the Accused’s actus reus of acting as a member is concerned, this comprises two parts: shouting the slogan “Yo Ah Yo”; and identifying himself to ASP Diong as a secret society member. I will deal with each part in turn.

Shouting of the slogan “Yo Ah Yo”

During the hearing before me, the Prosecution took the position that an offender who merely acts as a member of an unlawful society is less culpable than an offender who actually is a member. I.e. culpability under the ‘acting as a member’ limb of s 14(3) of the Societies Act is lower than that under the ‘being a member’ limb. Still, the Prosecution said that the harm from publicly partaking in secret society activities is the same, regardless of whether the offender was merely acting as a member or whether he actually was a member of the society concerned.

According to the Prosecution, the vast majority of cases pertaining to the membership prohibition under s 14(3) of the Societies Act were prosecuted under the ‘being a member’ limb. The Prosecution was aware of only one case, PP v Suffiandy Bin Abdul (SC-900835-2018, unreported) (“Suffiandy”), where the offender was prosecuted under the ‘acting as a member’ limb.

In Suffiandy, the offender had posed for a photograph while putting up the secret society’s hand sign and thereafter posted the photograph on Facebook. He was charged with (inter alia) acting as a member of a secret society under s 14(3) of the Societies Act and sentenced to 2 months’ imprisonment for that charge. During the hearing before me, the Prosecution relied on Suffiandy to submit that an offender need not have perpetrated gang-related violence for his conviction under s 14(3) of the Societies Act to attract a custodial sentence. However, the Prosecution caveated that the precise length of Suffiandy’s custodial term could have been a function of the offender’s heavy antecedents.

The Prosecution also cited two other precedents where the charge was for being a member of an unlawful society under s 14(3) (unlike in Suffiandy, where the charge was for acting as a member): In PP v Jaiseelan s/o Muthusamy (SC-903241-2018, unreported) (“Jaiseelan”), the offender attended a funeral while sporting tattoos and wearing a shirt with emblems tied to his secret society. He was sentenced to 10 weeks’ imprisonment for the charge under s 14(3) of the Societies Act. In PP v Ho Kok Fah (SC-902742-2018, unreported) (“Ho Kok Fah”), the offender initiated a settlement talk and brought his fellow secret society members to attend the talk (which ended amicably). He was sentenced to 3 months’ imprisonment. As with Suffiandy, custodial terms were imposed for the s 14(3) charge in both Jaiseelan and Ho Kok Fah, despite the absence of any accompanying gang violence. However, as with Suffiandy, the offenders in Jaiseelan and Ho Kok Fah were heavily traced for antecedents.

I set out the salient aspects of Suffiandy, Jaiseelan and Ho Kok Fah below:

Case	Facts	Antecedents	Outcome
Suffiandy	The offender attended a birthday celebration of a gang member, during which he posed for a photograph while showing the hand sign of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ ‘18’ Group secret society. He also posted the photograph on his Facebook account. This formed the subject of the Societies Act charge. Investigations revealed that the offender was a member of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society, until he was detained under the Criminal Law Temporary Provisions Act (“CLTPA”). The offender pleaded guilty to: - one charge under s 14(3) of the Societies Act, for acting as a member of the ‘Sio Gi Ho’ secret society; - one charge under s 128I(1)(b) of the Customs Act, for being concerned in dealing with duty unpaid cigarettes; - one charge under s 8(b)(ii) of the Misuse of Drugs Act, for consumption of methamphetamine; and - two charges for failure to report for urine testing.9 He

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