Sex Monster Looks for 'Easy Targets' in Library
HIS SENTENCE: 12 years' jail, 12 cane strokes
HIS PREY: Boy, 6, who goes to toilet alone
HE WAS arrested for performing oral sex on a 6-year-old boy in a library toilet.
By Amanda Yong
17 May 2009
HE WAS arrested for performing oral sex on a 6-year-old boy in a library toilet.
After Chan Kok Weng, 29, was charged for the offence, he was sent for a psychiatric assessment.
And that was when he made an explosive confession - he had been preying on young boys for about 15 years.
Chan told Dr Stephen Phang, senior consultant psychiatrist at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH), that he had been a sexual predator since he was in Secondary Two.
He would seek out primary schoolboys at public places and perform oral sex on them.
Chan revealed to Dr Phang: '(I) always target young boys, less than 10 years old or 11 years old because it's the easiest target. Most of them are Chinese... it's easier to communicate with them'.
He also said that he usually targeted 'primary school boys because it's easier to get trust from them.'
When he found a 'target', he would 'look out carefully, and plan carefully, before I did the thing, is he alone, or any adults accompany with him... if this happen, then I will not go, because I don't think I can succeed.
'Because there's someone with him. One thing is, they'll call the police. And the person there will not accept this thing.'
The driver cum deliveryman claimed that it all started when he was in Primary One after an older schoolmate in 'Primary Five or Primary Six' did it to him.
While in Secondary Two, Chan began to do the same to younger boys, so much so that 'this practice has become his sole outlet for sexual arousal and gratification', wrote Dr Phang in a psychiatric report submitted to the court.
This continued until last year when Chan was caught after sexually abusing a preschooler in a toilet at the Yishun Community Library on 27 Apr.
Chan pleaded guilty to one count of sexual penetration of a minor on Thursday. He was jailed for 12 years and given 12 strokes of the cane yesterday.
Chan had gone to the library after lunch to look for 'targets' - young boys going to the toilet alone.
When Chan saw a 6-year-old boy about to enter the toilet alone, he immediately went inside to wait for the boy.
Once the boy stood in front of a urinal, Chan approached and got him to remove his shorts and underwear.
He then lifted the boy with his left hand and molested him.
Next, he took the boy into a cubicle and performed oral sex on him.
When he heard the boy's mother calling for the boy, Chan was afraid and helped the boy put his clothes back on. He opened the cubicle door and let the boy out.
He also helped the boy to wash his hands. It was this very act that gave Chan away.
When the boy met his mother outside, she noticed that his hands were wet. Knowing that he could not reach the tap, she asked if anyone had helped him to wash his hands.
That was when the boy told his mother about his encounter with Chan.
His mother immediately informed a library officer who got a male library helper to check the male toilet.
He found a toilet cubicle occupied but did not receive a response when he knocked on the door.
Chan eventually emerged from the cubicle and was identified by the boy who was waiting outside the toilet with his mother.
Chan was arrested by the police the same day.
He told Dr Phang that he had performed the sexual act on the boy because 'I want to know the feeling of enjoyment. To feel that excitement'.
While Chan was aware that what he had done was illegal and against social norms, he said: 'I'm doing this for very long, and it's enjoyable, and I think I never cause any harm to the person.'
He said he did not have any 'abnormal experiences' at the time of the offence but claimed to 'have heard 'voices' located within his mind for many years, instructing him to search for more 'victims'.
And although he had a girlfriend for a number of years, the purpose of their relationship was to 'cover up' his 'true sexual preference/orientation'.
Chan said that sex with his then-girlfriend 'don't have that kind of feeling which make me happiness'.
He said that sexual intercourse with his girlfriend was 'to satisfy her' rather than for his own sexual gratification.
Chan told Dr Phang that he surfed paedophile websites 'about three to four times a week'. These websites featured mainly 'young boys'.
Chan confessed that he lived out his deviant fantasies and engaged in such behaviour 'sometimes few months once, and only Saturday and Sunday' as he was busy at work on weekdays.
His family were completely in the dark about his deviant sexual urges and practices. Dr Tommy Tan, a psychiatrist in private practice who took the stand for the defence, said that it was 'only after his arrest that he told his parents about his (sexual) tendencies'.
Chan's father had also told Dr Tan that his son had a girlfriend for between four and five years when he was in secondary school and the Institute of Technical Education. They broke up when Chan was doing National Service.
In her written mitigation, Chan's lawyer, Mrs Christine Sekhon, said that her client had been very stressed during the period of the offence due to his mother's hospitalisation.
His mother had a gallstone operation a few days before he committed the sexual act on the boy.
Chan's father said his son was 'very stressed having to drive his father to and fro from their home in Yishun and Changi General Hospital'.
Mrs Sekhon urged the court to take into account that Chan had 'cooperated so fully with the police that he even made a clean breast of his previous sexual urges relating to other young boys...'
She urged the court to impose the minimum sentence of eight years jail and 12 strokes of the cane.
But Dr Phang, speaking for the prosecution, said that Chan 'represents a very real risk of danger to potential future victims, which he has admitted he selects at random'.
He told the court that the intensity of Chan's paedophilic urges were so strong that he had actually ejaculated the night before one of his interviews with Dr Phang.
Dr Phang, who has seen many sex offenders in court, said this was 'the first time I've ever seen a sex offender in the mood to entertain sexual fantasies even while on remand. Most of the time, I find that this is the furthest thing for a sex offender who has been remanded.'
He said Chan 'was not of unsound mind' at the time of the offence. He added that he was of the opinion that Chan is an 'invariant, exclusive, homosexual paedophile'.
He explained that an 'invariant' paedophile is one who is 'primarily and preferentially engaged in sexual activity with prepubescent children. In other words, the invariant paedophile has no real interest in sexual activities with adults.'
Deputy Public Prosecutor Kan Shuk Weng said the facts of Chan's case were 'more aggravating' than those in the case of Selvaraju Jayaselvam who had been convicted of the same offence on 30 Mar this year. Selvaraju was sentenced to 10 years' jail and 12 strokes of the cane.
DPP Kan sought a sentence that would be no less than the one imposed on Selvaraju.
In sentencing, Justice Kan Ting Chiu said it was clear that Chan had 'from the earliest time admitted to the offence and you have been open again from the earliest time to explain your condition about your deviant conduct... some credit must be given to that.'
But Justice Kan added Chan had been 'engaged in these sorts of activities for a very long time, in a planned, premeditated and in the prosecution's words, predatory manner and in that sense you have been a real danger to young boys...'
The judge also said: '... both psychiatrists agree that you are an exclusive, homosexual paedophile and that the prospect of recovery even with psychodynamic psychotherapy is not good.
'And we have just realised that after today, you will not even be in an environment where you will be able to receive such therapy because you will be in prison, and not IMH where the resources are available.'
For committing sexual penetration of a minor, Chan could have been jailed for 20 years and given 12 strokes of the cane.
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