Singaporeans have the propensity to use academic grades as a gauge for ability and potential. Hence, when a top student commits criminal offences, it sends shock waves through the community.
This was the case for Colin Chua Yi Jin, who took several upskirt photos and secretly filmed his female friends from 2015 to 2018. The 24-year-old was a student at a top British university.
A gag order against his identity was lifted in Sep 2021 after one of the victims pushed for it.
For his offences, he received 12 months in jail in addition to a S$2,500 fine.
According to Channel NewsAsia (CNA), Chua started to target his female friends in junior college in 2015, all the way through National Service (NS) and then his undergraduate days in Oct 2018.
He would host gatherings at his home and invite his victims, secretly recording them through a device in his toilet.
A few of Chua’s videos – estimated to be in the hundreds – ended up on pornography sites and collected thousands of views.
He would carry out such offences due to stress from school or work, to the point where filming became an addiction.
For instance, he invited an 18-year-old female victim and her classmates to share a hotel room in Dec 2015. He then proceeded to film footage spanning 14 minutes of her showering.
The video then went online, gathering 177,000 views as of Aug 2020. The victim’s principal informed her of the situation in early 2016.
The student gave a victim impact statement, saying she received messages from friends and strangers regarding the footage.
She added that she felt embarrassed and betrayed by the incident. As a result, she turned down social activities in case she needed to use a public toilet. She also developed self-esteem issues.
This was not the last of Chua’s offences, with many more becoming the subject of his attention, reported The Straits Times (ST).
He took an upskirt video of a woman on an escalator. In 2016, he filmed a one-minute video of a 19-year-old victim relieving herself during a Christmas gathering at Chua’s home.
Almost two years later, she found the video had 38,000 views online after receiving screenshots from an unknown Instagram user asking if it was her. The experience left her feeling betrayed as it was a violation of trust. From then on, she felt a compulsive need to check for recording devices when visiting the toilet.
Local police forces raided Chua’s home on 3 Jul 2019 after receiving several reports between early 2016 and Jun 2019 that the two obscene videos featuring the complainants or their friends had been circulating online.
From seven of his personal devices, they uncovered 124 upskirt photos and 16 videos of acts insulting a woman’s modesty, 14 of which were in his home.
TODAY reports that during Chua’s initial charging in Oct 2019, he was an undergraduate from a top university in the UK.
Both the prosecution and defence argued about allowing him to continue attending the institute. In Jan 2020, courts ultimately banned Chua from leaving Singapore.
In Jul 2021, Chua pleaded guilty to seven counts of insulting a woman’s modesty and one count of having obscene films.
Arguing for a 13-month sentence and a S$3,500 fine for Chua, the deputy public prosecutors called him a “serial offender” who violated his friendships to commit such offences.
They also called the case “one of the most premeditated cases of voyeurism”.
Ultimately, Chua received a sentence of one year and a S$2,500 fine. District Judge Tan Jen Tse said this should strike a balance between his youth and the severity of his crimes.
“It is our hope as well that given his young age, the accused can become a better person and reform himself,” he said. “But that is not going to happen if he doesn’t realise the error of his ways.”
For insulting the modesty of a woman, the maximum sentence is a year’s jail and a fine for each charge.
For possessing obscene films, offenders can be jailed up to six months, fined up to S$20,000, or both.
Chua may have had a promising future for him. However, his crimes have caused his victims to suffer seemingly insurmountable trauma and mistrust.
As such, he deserves to be punished for the error of his ways, even as an undergraduate at a top university.
Hopefully, with this sentencing, the victims of Chua’s crimes have received the justice they need.
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Featured image by MS News.
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