Woman caught urinating in Pinnacle lift

At 8.22pm on May 23, a woman steps into Lift E at Block 1E in The Pinnacle@Duxton. She is alone.

She squats down. When she gets up, there is a pool of urine of the floor.

This indiscretion was captured by the closed-circuit television camera in the lift. Residents were appalled.

IT professional Dennis Kwan, 40, said: "I was surprised and shocked. I have been living here for four years and this is the first time this has happened.

"The fact that it is an adult is even more astonishing. I would have expected the culprit to be a pet or a child.

"Those of us living on the higher floors had to hold our breath all the way down."

Dr Irene Sim, a 32-year-old dentist whose husband came across the pool of urine, said: "I thought it was from a pet.

"Pinnacle is a nice estate and this shouldn't happen here. The lift was sticky and the stench persisted."

Financial services consultant Clara Tan, 25, said her extended family was complaining about the stench, which lasted about a week.

"There are public toilets in the nearby coffee shops. There must be something wrong with her - a mature adult - to do this. I avoided that particular lift after that."

The Tanjong Pagar Town Council later put up posters with caught two screengrabs of the CCTV footage. They showed the woman from the back.

Mentioning how the incident had "caused much inconvenience to the residents", the posters, which are in English and Chinese, "encourage all residents to take ownership of the common property".

The town council's public relations manager Shirley Aloysius said the Lift Surveillance System (LSS) was in place to deter crime and anti-social behaviour.

The aim of the posters was to seek help identifying the culprit as well as to deter such cases, she added.

Although the culprit has not been caught, the urination in the lift has stopped since the posters were put up.

Such images may be sent as evidence to the National Environmental Agency for prosecution, The Straits Times reported last year.

Those caught urinating in public places can be fined up to $150 under the Environmental Public Health Act. Recalcitrant offenders may be charged in court.

MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC, Dr Lily Neo, told The New Paper yesterday that the residents find such behaviour annoying.

"There were a few complaints in May by residents. The town council only follows through on complaints when there are quite a few of them. Only then do we check the CCTV footage," she said.

It is not known if the woman was responsible for the other incidents.

PROBLEMS

Dr Neo added: "We had problems stopping the urination in the lift.

"Only when we have no choice do we publish a picture in the hope that somebody would own up.

"This was not a case of elderly people who could not control themselves. She did it on purpose.

"It was not our intention to shame anybody, which is why we don't show their faces. We are just trying to solve residents' problems.

"We want to raise awareness and hope whoever is responsible will own up quickly.

"We want to be gracious and kind and not try to shame."

Dr Neo recalled a previous incident where a similar poster prompted the culprit, a 15-year-old boy, to own up and apologise.

PREVIOUS INCIDENT

Last year, the Tampines Town Council put up notices with images of two culprits taken from closed-circuit television footage after several complaints by residents at Block 366, Tampines Street 34.

One of the pictures showed the back view of a man smoking in a lift at about 5am on Jan 14.

The other showed a bare-bottomed woman squatting and, it is believed, urinating at around noon on Jan 15.

The images were blurred.

This article was first published on June 19, 2014.
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