2 jailed over upskirt videos

IN THE latest in a slew of convictions involving the taking of upskirt videos this month, two men in their 20s were given jail terms yesterday for filming women with their mobile phones.

Goh Han Siong, 24, would stand behind women on escalators in MRT stations and put his phone under their skirts.

The temporary university administrative assistant, who was jailed for eight weeks yesterday, took four upskirt videos of women in Simei and Clementi MRT stations on his way to and from work on Nov 19, 2013.

The next morning, he was filming a 27-year-old woman at Simei when her 28-year-old sister caught him in the act. The sister immediately grabbed his bag and shouted for help as he tried to flee. The victim seized Goh by the shirt as MRT security officers rushed forward to detain him.

Goh managed to delete all the videos from his phone during the struggle, but police were able to extract them later.

District Judge Michelle Yap said she considered Goh's attempt to erase evidence an aggravating factor and felt that he was "capable of curbing his own behaviour".

Meanwhile, a 22-year-old Vietnamese student from a local university was jailed for three weeks yesterday after pleading guilty to four charges of taking upskirt videos. Nguyen Tri Dung was arrested on Sept 16 last year when he took two videos of a Peruvian woman at a Pasir Panjang post office.

The 27-year-old victim was writing the address on a parcel when she felt a piece of plastic brushing against her leg. When she turned and saw the accused with a phone in his hand, she seized it from him and later called the police.

Dung's lawyer, Mr Amarjit Singh Sidhu, said in mitigation that his client had an internship with a reputable company and would be starting an exchange programme on a Ministry of Education tuition grant soon. A jail sentence, he said, would deprive him of these opportunities.

For each count of insulting modesty, the men could have been jailed for up to a year, fined, or both. At least seven men have been convicted of upskirt video offences so far this month.

oliviaho@sph.com.sg

This article was first published on May 26, 2015.
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