SINGAPORE: While in a Marina Bay Sands (MBS) hotel room with his friends, a teenage national serviceman accepted his friend’s dare to throw water bottles from the balcony to the ground floor.
Wang Li, now 19, tossed the plastic bottles down, with one landing behind a car near a traffic light and another being blown towards some trees.
An Instagram user lodged a police report after seeing an Instagram Story of a bottle being thrown down from the balcony.
Wang pleaded guilty on Tuesday (Aug 1) to one count of a rash act endangering the personal safety of others.
The court heard that Wang was with three friends at a hotel room on the 40th floor of MBS at about 12.30am on Jan 29 last year.
One of his friends and co-accused, 23-year-old Marcus Lim Jia Long, came up with a dare for someone to throw a plastic bottle from the balcony to the ground floor.
Lim offered S$10 (US$7.50) to anyone who took up the dare. Wang was tempted by the money, as he did not have any cash on him, the prosecutor said.
He took an empty plastic bottle, filled it half-full with water and threw it down from the balcony.
Lim took a video of Wang throwing it down from the balcony and uploaded it online as an Instagram Story.
When the bottle landed, there was a loud sound and Wang saw that it fell behind a car, which had stopped at a traffic light. He returned to the room and closed the balcony door to prevent anyone from spotting him.
Lim offered S$10 or S$15 for someone to throw a second bottle down.
“Since the accused had earlier thrown one bottle down, he decided that he might as well throw another bottle down,” said the prosecutor.
He threw another plastic bottle, which was filled to the quarter mark, from the balcony. The wind blew the bottle towards some trees.
About a week later, a man lodged an online police report saying that he had come across an Instagram Story of someone throwing a half-filled bottle down from the hotel balcony.
The informant said he had video proof of the Instagram Story.
The judge called for a probation report for Wang and adjourned sentencing to September. For committing a rash act endangering personal safety, he could be jailed up to six months, fined up to S$2,500, or both.