26-year-old food delivery rider, Lin Jiaqin, pleaded guilty on 12 July to the theft of 2 deity statues (which cost $1,888) from a car park at an industrial estate in Woodlands.
He was sentenced to 4 months imprisonment as well as a fine of $2,500.
What happened?
The theft took place on 21 September 2019 at about 3.11pm, at a carpark at 38 Woodlands Industrial park E1.
The manager of the building where the altar was housed had initially brought the statues to the altar outside the office at the carpark back in January 2019.
He was then informed on 23 September that the statues have disappeared, 2 days after the statues were stolen.
He then checked the CCTV footage and saw Lin, wearing his Foodpanda uniform and putting the statues inside his food delivery bag before cycling away.
Took it because it was “pretty”
The incident happened in 2019 and had gone viral on social media back then, with Shin Min Daily News also reporting about it in September that year.
Lin then reached out to SMDN saying that it was a misunderstanding, that he had brought the statues back home as it was “black and dirty”, assuming that nobody was worshipping it.
He said that he took the statues because they were “very pretty”.
He told the Chinese paper that he knows “very well” that the statues of deities cannot be taken away at will and used the crescent blocks to get the permission of the gods to let him take them home.
He later turned himself in to the police on 25 September.