Man risked falling five floors in rape attempt

Man risked falling five floors in rape attempt

Spending 20 years in prison for rape and robbery did not stop 43-year-old Razali Osman from risking a climb into a fifth-floor bedroom and trying to force himself on another woman - this time his sister's 31-year-old tenant.

On Wednesday, Deputy Public Prosecutor Christine Liu urged the court to send the delivery assistant and part-time cleaner to jail again for between 18 and 20 years, and give him 24 strokes of the cane.

The hearing was adjourned after Razali, who pleaded guilty to one count each of sexual assault, attempted aggravated rape and housebreaking, said he wanted to get a lawyer to deliver his mitigation.

The High Court heard how Razali, who has convictions going back to 1988, was last sent to jail in 1993 for raping three women, including his girlfriend's sister, as well as robbing two of them.

When he was released in February last year, his sister took him in as he had nowhere else to stay. A month later, the victim, a foreigner working here as an administrator, moved into his sister's flat and occupied the room beside his.

He sent the woman flowers and expressed his interest, but she told him she already had a fiance back home.

Rebuffed, Razali became frustrated.

On the night of Oct 20 last year, while the two of them were alone, he hatched a plan to get into her room to "teach her a lesson".

He took a precarious route, climbing out the living room window of the fifth-floor flat and into the window of her bedroom.

Once inside, he covered the victim's mouth and pinned her onto the bed.

As they struggled, he violated her and tried to rape her.

He eventually stopped after she repeatedly begged him to.

He told her that he was frustrated after she spurned his affections, and apologised.

He even provided his name and contact details and accompanied her downstairs, where she took a taxi to her friend's place.

The woman later made a police report and moved out of the flat.

The bespectacled Razali managed to evade capture for several days even as police laid ambushes for him in different locations.

But he was eventually arrested on Oct 24.


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