23 months’ jail and 6 cane strokes for police officer impersonator

The court punished a jobless man for duping and imposing as a police officer to an intellectually disabled woman with 23 months’ jail and six strokes of cane on 13 December.

The man, Samad Saptu (47) had posed as police officer and ordered a woman with mild intellectual disability to get into his car along a service road leading to Jalan Teck Whye on 1 August 2014, at around 6.30am.

The woman (32), a trainee at a special school, usually takes a bus on weekdays to a center where students are taught basic life skills such as cleaning, packing, baking, etc.

The Straits Times reported that Samad drove her to a multi-storey carpark in Bukit Panjang and parked there, then he showed her pornographic videos from his mobile phone.

He then asked her to move to the backseat, covered the windows of the car with towels and clothes, and then molested her.

He also opened her backpack and took a white envelope containing $50, which was intended for her school fees.

Around 3.40 pm, he drove the woman out of the car park and dropped her near a bus stop. She went home and told her mother, who took her to the police and made a report.

The police arrested Samad at his flat at Bukit Panjang on 3 August that year, and his mobile phone which had 25 obscene videos files was confiscated.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Kavita Uthrapathy said the victim had felt very scared and uncomfortable throughout the incident. He had demanded a two-year and six-stroke sentence for outrage of modesty, and six months for pretending to be a police officer.

She said Samad not only had robbed the victim of her dignity but also had stolen $50 from her.

“He had used the victim wholly for his own sexual and financial gratification. The despicable manner in which the accused committed the outrage of modesty offence must attract the maximum sentence prescribed for the offence,” she said.