SINGAPORE, Aug 28 — A man who stole cash cards from vehicles and took drugs was sentenced to almost two years’ jail yesterday, after admitting to peeping at a man and a woman using the toilet in separate incidents.
Alvin Niew Chin Leng had planted his mobile phone in a women’s toilet at a HomeTeamNS clubhouse branch.
However, a security officer found the device after the club’s management alerted him over suspicions that Niew had done this on previous occasions.
Niew, 32, pleaded guilty yesterday to six assorted charges — theft, criminal trespass, insulting a woman’s modesty, harassment by insulting behaviour, and consuming and possessing a controlled drug.
Ten other similar charges were taken into consideration for sentencing.
As Niew has been in remand since June 2019 and was previously remanded for several weeks, he is expected to be released from prison yesterday night after his sentence was backdated, his lawyer Josephus Tan from Invictus Law Corporation said.
Niew first stole two cash cards from a multi-storey car park in Sembawang on June 15 in 2018. This was when he was serving a remission order for a previous imprisonment stint.
Inmates who show good conduct are allowed to be released after serving two-thirds of their sentence. They will then be issued with a conditional remission order.
That morning, Niew, working as a private-hire car driver, had dropped off a passenger near Sembawang before realising his cash card was low on value and that he lacked the money to top it up.
He then decided to steal cards from nearby vehicles.
He checked several parked motorcycles but found no cash cards left behind in their in-vehicle units. He then discovered an unlocked van and stole two cash cards containing about S$12 (RM37) in value.
He was arrested later on September 5 in 2018 for consuming methamphetamine.
This happened after he had left his car unattended while stealing from a van at a Yishun car park. When the van driver called the police after Niew fled the scene, officers found a packet of the drugs and drug utensils in Niew’s car.
Niew’s sexual offences
Niew was then released on bail about a month later in October.
However, on November 5, he stuck his mobile phone in between the toilet window panels of a Housing and Development Board ground-floor flat.
He had been having supper nearby and was returning to his car when he heard sounds of someone taking a shower.
Inferring that a man was showering based on his coughing sounds, he decided to take a peep. He used his phone as a mirror to see what the victim was doing.
When the victim, now aged 30, noticed the phone, he shouted at Niew and quickly ran out of the toilet after getting dressed. However, Niew had fled in his car.
Another two months later, Niew struck at the HomeTeamNS Sembawang branch.
HomeTeamNS, a non-profit association, is a recreation club for operationally ready national servicemen of the Singapore Police Force and Singapore Civil Defence Force.
At midnight on January 16 last year, he went to a women’s toilet near the barbecue pits and placed his mobile phone in a gap between the ceiling and the light casing.
He put it in video recording mode, camouflaged it with black tape except for the front camera, and left.
He managed to film an unidentified woman using the toilet. When he returned later that night to retrieve his phone, a security officer had already taken it.
The officer reported the matter to the police.
Court documents showed that from July 2018 to June last year, Niew committed several other offences.
This included trespassing a women’s toilet at the National University of Singapore and another toilet along Tanjong Beach Walk on Sentosa Island, stealing tools and a parcel from a vehicle ata Yishun car park, and trying to steal a bag at Kallang Wave Mall.
In a report from the Institute of Mental Health, Niew was assessed to have voyeuristic disorder. — TODAY
