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SINGAPORE – The prosecution has urged a district court to sentence a Briton, convicted of sexually abusing a young child in Singapore, to at least two years in prison with four strokes of a cane.
Assistant District Attorney Nicholas Khoo told District Judge Chee Min Ping on Wednesday (February 3) that the offender, 29-year-old Richard Christopher Monks, had “invaded” an “intimate part” of the three-year-old’s body. .
The DPP also emphasized that Monks, who was then working as a reading specialist in a learning center, had “abused the trust placed in him” and had made the child the target of his “sickly” act of sexual abuse.
In his statement of protection, defense attorney Patrick Fernandez asked that his client be sentenced to one year in jail with two strokes of the cane.
She told Judge Chee: “Richard committed the crime in a momentary lapse of trial due to work-related stress and anxiety. Prior to the incident, Richard had informed his supervisor that he was having trouble sleeping and she advised him to watch to a doctor. “
The court heard that on December 20, 2018, Monks was prescribed the antidepressant Sertraline for anxiety and Xanax, a tranquilizer, for insomnia.
Monks is now free on a $ 5,000 bond and will be sentenced on March 3.
On Monday, he pleaded guilty to outraging the three-year-old’s modesty in his class on October 20, 2018.
Closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage taken from the classroom and played back on the court earlier this week showed him rearranging some chairs for a video viewing session around 5.18 p.m. that day.
There were six children in the classroom at the time and the victim was the youngest. The others were between four and five years old.
Aware that there was a camera installed in a corner of the classroom, recording images from a certain angle, Monks positioned himself behind the children so that he was directly in front of the CCTV camera.
As a result, the children’s upper body blocked the camera’s view of their hands.
“The lower half of the bodies (of the students) would also not be captured from that angle,” DPP Tan Hsiao Tien said Monday.
In the footage, Monks was seen standing behind the victim as he played a video on his mobile phone for the children to see. The children then leaned over a table to look at the phone screen.
The footage showed Monks repeatedly lifting the victim’s pink dress and stroking her buttocks with his left hand. She repeatedly turned to look at him as he committed the offense.
Monks was also seen using his right hand to hold another mobile phone near the victim’s buttocks, pointing at her skirt.
“The victim was uncomfortable with the defendant’s touch and expressed her discomfort by moving restlessly and turning to look at him several times during the mentioned time,” DPP Tan said.
“Despite (her) discomfort, the accused continued to touch and caress her buttocks.”
The offense came to light on October 27, 2018, as the girl’s parents were preparing to take her to the learning center for lessons. The boy was reluctant to go.
When asked why, she said that “master Richard” “touched” her and pointed to her buttocks.
Her mother alerted the police that same day and stopped sending her daughter to the center. Police arrested Monks on November 1, 2018, shortly after he returned to Singapore from a trip to Thailand.
For sexually abusing a child under the age of 14, an offender can be imprisoned for up to five years and fined or punished.
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