Teen pranks he had COVID-19 on Instagram, friend and his mates in NS training isolated, training disrupted

Singapore —  Siew Han Tong thought it would be fun to post photos of himself in a hospital bed, pretending he had Covid-19 and was going to die. But it ended up with some serious consequences for the prankster.

Siew, 19, has been put on probation for nine months. This means he must remain indoors between 11 pm and 6 am and perform 40 hours of community service. His parents have had to put up a $5,000 bond to ensure that he behaves during the probation period.

It was on May 23, that Siew decided to post a photo on IG stories of a positive Covid-19 test, followed by one of himself on a hospital bed. He knew he wasn’t infected.

Though he took the photos down about 15 minutes later, his friends were already abuzz with the fake news, who had no idea Siew was just pranking them.

One of them was a young soldier who was then at Pulau Tekong on national service duty. When he saw Siew’s Instagram post, he told his superiors he had contact with Siew.

As a result, he was sent away from the island, his NS mates had to be isolated, and his bunk needed to be disinfected.

The details show that there was some planning involved.

Siew had first searched online for a photo of a Covid-19 swab test with a positive result. At about 1 am on May 23, he posted the photo he found to Instagram and wrote this caption:

“Guys I got the new covid variant, bye I’m gonna die.”

Then he posted a photo of himself taken when he had previously been warded in hospital, but not for Covid-19. He captioned that photo: “In ICU right now, farewell guys.”

During the short time the posts were up, his friend who was in NS training, saw them after he woke up at 4:45 am, as their other friends were messaging one another about the posts.

Alarmed, as he knew he had been in contact with Siew before May 23, he tried to contact him but could not get through.

After he told his superiors, he was swab tested and sent home, where he isolated himself from his family. They also isolated the NS mates he had been in contact with and had his bunk disinfected. All that disrupted training.

By 11:15 am that day, Siew admitted it was a prank. The NS man then informed his superiors and his father, then filed a police report.

Siew pleaded guilty on Nov 2 to two counts of knowingly transmitting a false message under the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act. 

Before the judge, he apologised and promised he would not repeat his mistake. The judge told him that while he understood it was meant as a prank, it had had serious consequences.

His mother told the judge that Siew is contrite and asked the judge to consider his “bright future”. She described him as a “very sensible boy” pursuing a diploma while working part-time.

It could have been a lot worse for Siew. For communicating a false message, he could have been fined as much as $10,000, and jailed for as long as three years. /TISG

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