SINGAPORE, May 1 — A late-night consultation with her general practitioner over frequent urination resulted in her being allegedly raped, a 26-year-old woman testified in court yesterday (April 30).
The victim, who cannot be named due to a court gag order to protect her identity, took the stand behind closed doors on the first day of the rape trial for GP Wee Teong Boo, 67, who was charged with raping a patient in 2015.
Due to the seriousness of the allegations, since April last year, the doctor has been barred from seeing any female patients without a female chaperone present. The Singapore Medical Council’s (SMC) Interim Orders Committee had also barred him from conducting any examinations of the breast, pelvic, genital or anal areas of female patients.
His medical registration, however, was not suspended as he had not been convicted of rape or molest, and should be presumed innocent until proven guilty, the SMC had said.
On Monday, the court heard that the rape incident allegedly took place during a late-night consultation in the examination room of the doctor’s clinic, Wee’s Clinic & Surgery, in Bedok North Avenue 2 at 11.30pm on Dec 30, 2015.
The victim — a 23-year-old student then — was a regular patient of Wee, having seen him for a year for her gastric and acne issues. On the day of the incident, she was seeking treatment for frequent urination and an itch.
She was getting her lower abdomen checked by Wee when she felt him molest her, Deputy Public Prosecutor Sharmila Sripathy-Shanaz noted in her opening address. When Wee asked her if that was the area where she was experiencing the itch, she indicated it was.
Wee, apparently, then instructed her then to pull down her shorts and panties for further examination. Although she complied by pulling them down partially, the court heard that the doctor proceeded to remove them completely, before allegedly raping her.
Shocked, she gestured for Wee to stop. Wee let go of her, and turned his back on her.
However, after the said incident, she returned to the adjacent consultation room, where Wee spoke to her about the medication he was prescribing her. Before she collected her medication, the victim said she used the clinic’s toilet and found traces of blood on her panty liner, which she used to wipe herself as there was no toilet paper.
She could not sleep that night, and lodged a police report the next morning.
The prosecution will be calling 15 witnesses to provide evidence during the course of the trial, the court heard on Monday. One of them is the victim’s mother, who will testify that she spoke to her daughter in the early hours of the morning following her consultation, as she found her daughter tossing and turning in bed.
In an agitated manner, her daughter had told her that she felt offended by what Wee had done to her during the examination, according to DPP Sharmila.
Dr Janice Tung Su Zhen, an associate consultant with KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, who examined the victim a day after the alleged rape incident, will also take the stand.
Wee was also charged with outraging the modesty of the same victim on Nov 25, 2015, about a month before the said rape incident, as she had alleged that he had molested her during the course of an examination that day too.
A regular patient of Wee, she said she thought Wee behaved strangely that day, but did not voice her discomfort as she assumed it was part of the medical examination.
If convicted of rape, Wee can be jailed for up to 20 years and fined. As for molest, Wee could be jailed for up to two more years more if convicted. — TODAY
