Public Prosecutor v Pay Wee Meng

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Karolyn Gin
• Judgment Date: 05 May 2022
• Neutral Citation: [2022] SGMC 24
• Court: Magistrates' Court (Singapore)
• Hearing Date: 24 March 2022,08 April 2022,12 April 2022
• Docket Number: Magistrate’s Court Notice No. 901710 of 2021 and 3 Others, Magistrate’s Appeal No. 9066-2022-01
• Plaintiff Counsel: DPP Ng Shao Yan (Attorney-General's Chambers)
• Defendant Counsel: Accused-in-person.
• Subject Matter: Criminal Procedure and Sentencing,Sentencing,Principles,Criminal Law,Statutory offences,Protection from Harassment Act
• Published date: 12 May 2022

District Judge Karolyn Gin:

The Accused, Mr Pay Wee Meng (26 years old), had pleaded guilty to the following charges of unlawful stalking under section 7(1) of the Protection from Harassment Act (Cap 256A, 2015 Rev. Ed.) (“the Act”):

MCN-901710-2021 (1st Charge)

You,… are charged that you, from 2016 to 2018, in Singapore, did unlawfully stalk one (C) (“the Victim”) by engaging in a course of conduct which involved acts associated with stalking, to wit, you: i. Created posts on the social media platform, SgGirls.com (“the Platform”), containing photographs of the Victim; ii. Pretended to be the Victim on the Platform; and iii. Made communications to other persons on the Platform purporting to originate from the Victim and suggesting that the Victim was open to having sex with strangers,

thereby causing distress to the Victim, when you ought reasonably to have known that your conduct was likely to cause distress to the Victim, and you have thereby contravened Section 7(1) of the Protection from Harassment Act (Chapter 256A, 2015 Rev Ed) and committed an offence punishable under Section 7(6) of the same Act.

MCN-901711-2021 (2nd Charge)

You,… are charged that you, from 2016 to 2021, in Singapore, did unlawfully stalk one (C) (“the Victim”) by engaging in a course of conduct which involved acts associated with stalking, to wit, you: i. Created posts on the social media platform, Tumblr (“the Platform”), containing photographs of the Victim; ii. Pretended to be the Victim on the Platform; and iii. Made communications to other persons on the Platform purporting to originate from the Victim and suggesting that the Victim was open to having sex with strangers,

thereby causing distress to the Victim, when you ought reasonably to have known that your conduct was likely to cause distress to the Victim, and you have thereby contravened Section 7(1) of the Protection from Harassment Act (Chapter 256A, 2015 Rev Ed) and committed an offence punishable under Section 7(6) of the same Act.

Two other charges under section 7 of the Act were taken into consideration.

After having considered the Prosecution’s submissions on sentence and the Accused’s mitigation plea, I sentenced the Accused to an imprisonment term of 12 weeks’ imprisonment on each charge. Both sentences were ordered to run concurrently.

The Accused’s request for a deferment of two weeks was granted. Subsequently, by way of APP-2022-0324-65966, the Accused applied for further deferment and a deferment of three weeks was granted.

Thereafter, the Accused filed application APP-2022-0328-67428 requesting further mention. Due to information from his company that he could not apply for three months’ leave, he sought a lower sentence such as six weeks’ imprisonment or a fine.

As the sentence had already been imposed, the application for further mention was not granted.

The Accused then filed an appeal and these are the grounds for my decision.

Statement of Facts

A summary of the facts as contained in the Statement of Facts (“SOF”), which the Accused has admitted to without qualification, are set out as follows.

The Accused was the Victim’s schoolmate in secondary school and she was 19 years old at the earliest time of the offences.

After the Accused graduated from secondary school, he started creating accounts on various social media platforms using the Victim’s name and photographs. He obtained these photographs from the Victim’s social media account. Using the accounts which he created, he posted captions with sexual connotations as he wanted other guys to talk to him about sex.

From 2016 to 2018 and from 2016 to 2021, in Singapore, the Accused did unlawfully stalk the Victim by using the social media platforms, SgGirls.com and Tumblr respectively (collectively “the Platforms”). He did this by engaging in a course of conduct which involved acts associated with stalking as follows: Creating posts on the Platforms, containing photographs of the victim; Pretending to be the Victim of the Platforms; and Making communications to other persons on the Platforms purporting to originate from the Victim and suggesting that the Victim was open to having sex with strangers.

As a result of the Accused’s conduct, the Victim was informed by her friends and strangers on multiple occasions that there was someone impersonating her on the Platforms and stating that she was open to having sex with strangers. Upon checking, the Victim found her photographs circulating on various social media platforms with accompanying posts soliciting for sex. She was also contacted by strangers who requested to meet up with her for sex. Even the Victim’s friends received texts from strangers asking them if they knew the Victim.

This caused distress to the Victim. The Accused ought reasonably to have known that his conduct was likely to cause distress to the Victim.

The Accused had thereby contravened section 7(1) of the Protection from Harassment Act (Chapter 256A, 2015 Rev Ed) and committed two counts of an offence punishable under section 7(6) of the same Act.

The Accused had also engaged in the aforementioned acts associated with stalking against the Victim on ASK.FM from 2017 to 2018 and Instagram in 2017 (subject of the charges taken into consideration).

Prescribed Penalties

The prescribed punishment for an offence under section 7(1) of the Act is a fine not exceeding $5,000 or imprisonment for a term not exceeding 12 months or both.

Antecedents

The Accused was untraced.

Prosecution’s Submissions on Sentence

The Prosecution referred to the sentencing framework as set out in the three-Judge High Court decision of Lee Shing Chan v Public Prosecutor and another appeal [2020] SGHC 41 (“Lee Shing Chan”) and submitted the present offence should be classified as low harm and medium culpability under that framework, albeit at the higher end of the range. This was derived as follows.

Low harm: The Accused caused harm to the Victim’s reputation and mental health through his conduct. He suggested that the Victim was open to having sex with strangers by posting her photographs on the accounts which he created, impersonating the Victim and making sexual posts with these accounts. The Victim was contacted by strangers asking her for sex and the harm extended to third parties because the Victim’s friends were also contacted by strangers to try and get to the Victim through them.

In the similar case of Public Prosecutor v Lim Teck Guan [2021] SGMC 2 (“Lim Teck Guan”), the court found that the case fell within the medium harm category in the Framework. In Lim Teck Guan, the accused posted compromising photographs of the victim, including photographs of her topless in bed, with captions containing sexual innuendos. The accused publicly identified the victim through her occupation and place of work. He also extended the harm to third parties by posting the contact...