A 40-year-old man in Singapore has been charged with abduction for forced illicit intercourse and criminal force to outrage the victim’s modesty today (16 Sep). On 1 Mar 2021, he molested a woman sleeping on a chair in an alley in Geylang.
When the 53-year-old woman, who was a sex worker, did not respond to his attempts to wake her up, he brought her to a secluded area to sexually assault her further.
The perpetrator, Patian Sohag, is a Bangladeshi national who had worked at a chemical plating factory in Singapore for 16 years, reports TODAY.
The court sentenced him to 3.5 years’ jail along with three strokes of the cane. They also considered a third charge of misappropriation during sentencing.
According to Channel NewsAsia (CNA), Patian was drinking with his friends from 10pm on 28 Feb 2021.
At around 2am, he headed to Geylang with a friend to find sex workers.
Thinking that the prices the workers quoted were “too high”, he continued scouting the area for options even after his friend left.
He eventually found a woman asleep on a chair along Lorong 20 Geylang at about 3.20am.
Source: Insider
Prior to the encounter, CNA wrote that she had consumed “power pills” at a nearby coffee shop to make her “feel alert”.
After checking his surroundings, Patian approached the woman and attempted to wake her up.
Upon realising that she was in a deep sleep, he allegedly touched her chest and private parts under her clothes repeatedly. Unbeknownst to Patian, his actions were captured on CCTV.
Footage showed him lifting the woman from the chair and carrying her to a secluded area surrounded by potted plants.
Patian then laid her on the ground and proceeded to have sex with her, leaving the scene six minutes later.
The victim was seen stumbling back to her original seat and dozing off about a minute later.
When she woke up, the victim discovered a moist and sticky substance on her underwear and jeans.
The Straits Times (ST) stated that she filed a police report, claiming that she had been raped and that her phone had gone missing.
Patian’s semen was found on the victim’s vaginal swabs. Police arrested him a week later on 4 Mar.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Delicia Tan asked for four years and three months’ jail with three strokes of the cane.
In response, Patian’s lawyer Mr Ashwin Ganapathy pleaded for three years’ jail with three strokes of the cane instead.
He was aware of the severity of the case and acknowledged that the victim was vulnerable, both because of the drugs she had consumed and the fact that she was a sex worker, who would typically be reluctant to come forward, noted CNA.
Nonetheless, Mr Ganapathy highlighted that Patian had been working in Singapore for the past 16 years to support his elderly parents back home.
TODAY quoted the lawyer’s admission of his client’s guilt:
The victim has suffered greatly and our client must be held accountable. He fully accepts the wickedness of his actions… and takes full responsibility.
According to CNA, he asked that the sentences run concurrently rather than consecutively, as the prosecution requested.
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Featured image adapted from pixculture on Flickr, for illustration purposes only.
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