Full-time National Serviceman Darren Tan Yong Xin admitted to one count of insulting the modesty of a woman, one count of attempting to do so and one count of possessing four obscene films in court yesterday.
The 26-year-old was caught at a Cotton On outlet at Vivocity on 30 April 2016, after he filmed an upskirt video of a woman in the fitting room beside his. Successful the first time, Darren tried the stunt again on a second woman who entered the fitting room but was caught red-handed instead.
The second woman, a 21-year-old student, noticed Tan holding his mobile phone under the partition separating their stalls – he had his screen on and facing up and was clearly filming the woman using the phone’s front-facing camera.
The woman immediately approached the outlet’s staff who confiscated Darren’s phone and called the police. Darren was arrested after police found the video of the woman changing together with a number of other obscene videos.
This is not the first time that Darren has been busted for attempting to take upskirt shots of women. The court heard that he did so at least once before three years ago, when he tried to snap an upskirt photo of a 32-year-old banker at Yio Chu Kang MRT station on 15 July 2014.
The woman who was going up to the MRT platform on the escalator caught Darren in the act when she felt a tugging sensation at the lower half of her dress. When she turned, near the top of the escalator, she saw Darren standing close behind her with his phone beneath her dress.
Startled at being caught, Darren rushed off the escalator, ran down the stairs and escaped the station. However, police managed to identify and arrest him later.
The court heard that Darren was only walking past the station when he noticed the woman and decided to follow her through the MRT gantry when he felt an urge to take and upskirt shot of her. In the 2016 fitting room cases, Darren reportedly decided to film the first woman because he noticed her going into the fitting room next to him and thought she was attractive.
Darren faces a maximum of one year in jail and/or a fine for insulting the modesty of a woman. He may be jailed up to six months for possessing obscene films or fined at least $500 for each film in his possession during his sentencing on 11 September.
Meanwhile, the Singapore Police Force (SPF) reported that there is an uptrend in Outrage of Modesty Cases in the first half of this year, with 717 cases being registered between Jan and Jun 2017.
The Mid-Year Crime Statistics released by the SPF yesterday revealed that there was a spike of 9.5% more cases than the number of Outrage of Modesty cases from the same period last year.
The report also identified public transport as a “worrying” hotspot where such incidents occur, with 70 Outrage of Modesty cases being reported in public transport from Jan to Jun 2017.
https://theindependent.sg.sg/4-molest-cases-reported-on-average-per-day-cases-in-public-transport-high-spf/