A 46-year-old man, working as a principal engineer, had a crush on a 23-year-old male intern at his company, and took multiple voyeuristic videos of the man inside the toilet, according to The Straits Times.
He pleaded guilty to 2 counts of filming the victim without consent while he was doing a private act and was sentenced on Friday (13 October) to 12 weeks.
The offender cannot be named because of a court order protecting the identity of the victim.
Background Information
The offender, working as a principal engineer at a company since 2014, first noticed the victim when he joined the company earlier this year in January.
The offender’s infatuation with the young intern soon turned sinister. On eight separate occasions between January and March 2023, he secretly recorded videos of the victim while he was engaged in private activities inside the toilet.
During an incident in mid-January, the offender’s voyeuristic behaviour came to light. He noticed that the victim, the object of his crush, frequented a handicapped cubicle in the restroom at approximately 4 p.m. each day.
Seizing an opportunity on January 31, the offender used his mobile phone to record a video of the victim through the gap between the cubicle partition and the floor, as the latter was squatting on the floor inside the toilet cubicle to clean himself.
The victim, however, quickly noticed the intrusion hit the cubicle partition in response, and took a photo of the man’s shoes through the gap in the toilet. Disturbed by the incident, the victim promptly reported it to his supervisor, and they then waited outside the toilet to try and catch the mysterious offender.
The Impact on the Victim
His supervisor suggested that it might have been a misunderstanding, possibly just someone retrieving their mobile phone that they dropped on the floor.
Encouraged by this interpretation, the victim gave the offender the benefit of the doubt. However, the disturbing incidents did not stop there.
On February 24, the offender recorded the victim once again, prompting the victim to alert his supervisor.
After identifying the offender from the company’s organizational chart, the victim sent an internal email complaint to the management. Yet, the situation did not improve.
On March 10, the offender once more invaded the victim’s privacy. The victim, this time, decided to escalate the matter further. He informed the company’s management and initiated an internal investigation. Subsequently, he was advised to make a police report.
In total, the offender recorded the victim on eight different occasions, with seven of those recordings capturing the victim’s private parts.
Legal Consequences
The prosecution sought an imprisonment term of between 12 to 13 weeks against the offender, arguing that because of what he did, the victim now can’t enter a toilet without feeling uncomfortable.