A 29-year-old British reading teacher insulted a 3-year-old female student’s hips for 15 minutes during class, and pleaded guilty this morning to one count of s*xually assaulting a girl under the age of 14.
Richard Christopher Monks originally pleaded not guilty, but he changed his testimony before the trial started today and expressed his willingness to plead guilty.
It was revealed in court that the defendant was a reading expert teacher at a language center. The Education Center specializes in providing reading courses for children from 3 to 12 years old.
In addition to the victim girl in the reading class, the defendant was in charge of, there were five other four or five-year-old students. The girl was the youngest in the class and was only 3 years and 11 months old at the time of the crime.
On a certain day in October 2018, the defendant arranged for students to watch the video during class, put the mobile phone on the table, and then asked the students to watch it around the table. The defendant sat behind the students and took the opportunity to touch the girl’s buttocks for 15 minutes.
Monks was also seen using his right hand to hold his Sony handphone camera close to the victim’s buttocks, pointing it up her skirt.
He later left Singapore on Oct 27, 2018, and travelled to Thailand. He returned four days later on Oct 31, and was subsequently arrested on Nov 1, 2018.
The DPPs indicated that while the CCTV footage does capture the accused repeatedly pointing the Sony handphone camera at the three-year-old’s buttocks, investigations could not determine how many photos or videos were taken by the accused, due to his claim that he lost the phone in Thailand.
Since both parties need time to make submissions on the penalty, the judge extended the case to Wednesday (3rd) the day after tomorrow to hand down the sentence.
According to the law, the defendant will face up to five years in prison, fines, or caning, or any combination of penalties.