SINGAPORE, Sept 4 — Some time after leaving his office at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Lin Junquan noticed a woman wearing a denim skirt and felt an urge to record an upskirt video of her.
But his attempt was foiled as he did not place his phone at the correct angle.
After he was caught by the police, Lin, 33, admitted to recording about 10 upskirt videos every month from August 2020, though he had started taking such videos in 2018 but with less frequency.
When pleading for leniency during his court hearing today, Lin, called his actions “deplorable” and apologised to his victims.
He was sentenced to eight months’ jail and fined S$1,000 (RM3,435) after pleading guilty to two charges of voyeurism and one charge of possessing obscene films.
In response to TODAY’s queries today, an NTU spokesperson said Lin had been dismissed in 2021.
Under a court order, the victim’s name and some other details in the case cannot be pubished so as to protect the victim’s identity.
What happened
On March 22, 2021 at around 3.30pm, Lin knocked off work for the day as a researcher at NTU.
Later, Lin saw a woman near a bus stop. Noticing that she was wearing a denim skirt, Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Edwin Ho said that Lin “felt an urge to record an upskirt video of her”.
Following her, Lin took out his phone and tried to position his phone camera underneath the woman’s skirt.
However, he was unsuccessful in capturing an upskirt video as his phone camera was not at the right angle.
Court documents stated that the two did not know each other and the duration of the recorded video was 13 seconds.
After his failed attempt, Lin continued his journey home.
Later, when he alighted from the bus, he saw another woman wearing a short black skirt and felt an urge to record an upskirt video again.
At about 4.51pm, he followed the second victim from behind while she was taking an upward escalator to the train platform.
While she was standing on the escalator, Lin reached out with his phone camera pointed upwards underneath her skirt. This time, he managed to take an explicit video of the woman.
Court documents stated that this video lasted 38 seconds. The pair did not know each other.
His actions did not go unnoticed. A passerby who was standing behind Lin on an escalator noticed what he was doing and stopped him by holding onto his bag when the latter reached the end of the escalator.
The passerby then took Lin to an SMRT staff member at the platform area and a police report was lodged.
When confronted by the police, Lin told them that he would record about three upskirt videos every three to five months between 2018 and August 2020.
From August 2020 onwards, he recorded about 10 upskirt videos per month as he “noticed that there were more female subjects wearing skirts” in the region of Pioneer, DPP Ho said.
Lin would keep the videos, edit them and save them inside a “secret folder”, which he would revisit whenever he felt the urge to masturbate.
During police investigations, Lin was also caught with 35 obscene films on his devices. They were pornographic videos downloaded from various websites “for his personal use”, said DPP Ho.
‘Deplorable criminal acts’ says offender
DPP Ho sought a sentence of between nine and 13 months’ jail, as well as a fine with an amount left to the court’s discretion.
Addressing the court, Lin pleaded for leniency and said that he had cooperated with the police during investigations.
“I sincerely apologise to all the victims for my deplorable criminal acts. This is the first and last time that I will be doing this and I promise that this won’t ever happen again,” he said.
Taking into consideration that Lin was a first time offender who cooperated with the police, District Judge Wong Li Tein sentenced him to eight months jail and a S$1,000 fine.
Anyone found guilty of voyeurism can be jailed for up to two years, fined, caned, or given any combination of the three.
Possessing obscene films carries a punishment of up to 12 months jail or a fine of up to S$40,000, or both.
In the statement, the NTU spokesperson said: “The university takes a zero tolerance approach towards sexual harassment.” — TODAY