A mentally ill 22 year-old Soh Wee Boon was sentenced to 4 months jail today for threatening a 24 year-old woman on 16th December last year and forcing her to watch as he fondled himself in public in front of her.
However, the court backdated Soh's sentence to his remand since April this year and he was allowed to leave a free man immediately after the sentencing.
The former waiter was convicted of criminal intimidation and insulting a woman's modesty in Woodlands.
On 16th December, Soh had approached a 24 year-old woman who was walking home in the evening and asked her to buy some tissue packets from him. He told her about his family background and tried to gain her sympathy.
When the woman refused and told him that she did not have enough money to buy the tissue packets, he forced her into a corner of the void deck and told her not to shout or call the police as he had a penknife.
Fearing for her life, she kept silent as he started to touch himself in front of her.
According to Soh's defence lawyer Mr Ng Shi Yang from the Criminal Legal Aid Scheme Fellowship, Soh suffers from mild intellectual disability and has previous convictions for theft, committing an obscene act, insulting modesty and criminal breach of trust.
Mr Ng added that Soh and his mother are the sole breadwinners of the family. His stepfather is serving a jail sentence for drug-related offences and his elder brother, life imprisonment for culpable homicide. His younger brother had been detained in the Boys' Home before.
Mr Ng said Soh intends to continue his outpatient treatment at the Institute of Mental Health.
He asked for a sentence that would allow Soh to be released and this was granted by District Judge Lim Keng Yeow.
Still, Judge Lim said he was concerned that Soh reoffended not long after he was last sentenced for another similar offence.
He told Soh that it was "absolutely essential" that he commits himself to treatment "not just for a short period of time, but for weeks and months to come."
Soh could have been jailed for up to two years and/or fined for criminal intimidation; and jailed for up to one year and/or fined for insulting modesty.
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