SINGAPORE: When he was in his late teens, a student volunteer with a non-profit society sexually abused three boys whom he was tasked to care for or give tuition to.
The crimes went uncovered until 2019, when one of the victims, who was now a man, read a news report about sexual assault and decided to lodge a police report about the abuse he had suffered as a boy.
Investigations uncovered two other victims, whom the prosecution said suffered scars and trauma as a result of the offences.
The offender, a 48-year-old primary school teacher who has been suspended, was sentenced to eight years’ jail on Monday (Nov 27).
He pleaded guilty to three charges of committing an indecent act with a child and having carnal intercourse against the order of nature, with another eight charges taken into consideration.
The offender and the society he volunteered with cannot be named due to gag orders issued by the court to protect the identities of the victims, who are now between 36 and 40.
THE CASE
The court heard that the man was a beneficiary of an unnamed society when he was a boy.
When he was a 17-year-old student, he began volunteering at the same society, which provided student care services for children from low-income or troubled households.
As a student volunteer, the offender was tasked to supervise children in their studies and to befriend them.
However, he sexually abused three of them – V1, who was between 10 and 12; V2, who was between nine and 12; and V3, who was between five and eight at the time.
He committed an indecent act with V2 in a children’s playroom, after the rest of the children and volunteers had left, sometime between 1993 and 1994.
Between that same time period, the offender also began to hit V1’s private parts over his shorts.
The boy did not think much of it at first as he thought it was part of regular horseplay.
However, on one occasion, the offender gave V1 private mathematics tuition. He asked the boy to sit on his lap and would slap his private parts if the boy gave the wrong answer to math questions.
The offender also sexually abused V1 and V2 while giving them private tuition at V2’s home.
He forced a sex act on V3, causing the boy to feel uncomfortable, angry and very disgusted.
However, none of the boys reported what happened at the time of the offences between 1993 and 1995, as they were too young to understand that what the perpetrator had done was wrong.
The offender was trusted by the society and the parents of the children, and no concerns were raised.
The man stopped volunteering in 1999 and became a primary school teacher.
The case went silent for decades until August 2019, when V1 read a news article about victims of sexual crimes.
He felt motivated to make a police report, revealing what the offender had done to him when he was receiving childcare services between Primary 3 and Primary 6.
Investigations uncovered the offences against the other two victims, and the offender was arrested later in August 2019.
The man’s lawyer, Mr Rai Satish, said his client had not offended since.
“In the course of his career, he has had interactions with hundreds, if not thousands of children and he has never abused his position of trust and responsibility in relation to these children,” said Mr Satish.
“He had learnt while training for his career that what he had done was wrong, and he learnt what is appropriate and inappropriate behaviour.”
The lawyer said his client was a teenager when he committed the offences and he was “trying to understand this sexual awakening which was happening to him”.
“Unfortunately, he did not have a proper outlet or guidance. He was insecure about his sexual awakening and this was a major impetus to the commission of the offences,” said Mr Satish.
He added that there was not a great age disparity between the victims and the accused, who was a student himself.
At this, Justice Dedar Singh Gill interjected and said he had “great difficulty” accepting this argument, as the accused was plainly in a position of authority.
The lawyer acknowledged this and added that the victims had said that they forgave the accused, or that the accused had gone out of his way to help them.
MAN APOLOGISES TO COURT
The offender was allowed to read a letter he had personally prepared. Unfolding a piece of paper, he said he was deeply remorseful.
In a shaky voice, he said he accepted full responsibility for his actions and apologised to his victims, as well as his parents and brother.
“I promised my late father, who passed away in 2012, to take care of my mother,” said the man.
“When I was in need of a bailor, my mother used up her life savings. I have let both my parents down. Sorry father, mother and brother. I am ashamed of what I have done, and I hurt my family the most.”
He said he stayed at home most of the time when he was on bail and cried himself to sleep at the thought of what he did.
“My mother suffered when she saw what happened to me. I have written apology letters to the three victims and handed them to my lawyer as I was not allowed to contact them,” said the man.
“I definitely will not perform such acts again as I do not want my parents to be ashamed of me.”
Deputy Public Prosecutor Tay Jia En asked for eight to 10 years’ jail. Not only was the accused a student volunteer, he was described as a special volunteer, who was given accolades.
While the defence said it looked like V3 had forgiven the offender, Mr Tay said it was clear that V1 and V3 still carried with them “scars of their trauma”.
V1 suffered from an identity crisis and confidence issues, while the offences estranged V3 from his mother, who did not believe V3 when V3 tried to tell her about the incidents.
While the offender has moved on and achieved “some measure of success” as a teacher, the victims still carry with them these scars, said Mr Tay.
Although the offender was a “lauded student volunteer” who was praised by the society, Mr Tay said accused persons sometimes “carry on with two parallel lives”, with the man’s positive engagements contrasted with the “darker side” of him that nobody could detect.
The judge noted that the man had plainly abused his position of trust and authority over the victims, who were vulnerable due to their young ages.
Across all the charges, the offences stretch from 1992 to 1996, said the judge.
However, he noted the plea of guilt and the man’s relative youth when he committed the offences. He allowed the man to begin his jail term in December.