Source: Terry Xu/TOC

The criminal defamation trial of The Online Citizen (TOC) website’s chief editor Terry Xu and TOC contributor Daniel De Costa commenced on Monday (26 October) with the prosecution’s cross-examination of the latter’s friend Sim Wee Lee on the witness stand.

Mr Sim’s Yahoo! email account was said to have been used by Mr De Costa two years ago to send the allegedly defamatory material to TOC.

The letter, titled “PAP MP apologises to SDP”, was reportedly sent from the account on 4 Sep 2018 with the intention of having the contents of that email to be published on TOC.

Mr De Costa was additionally charged for committing an offence under the Computer Misuse Act of Singapore.

Published on TOC on 4 Sep 2018, the article submitted by Mr De Costa alleged that “we have seen multiple policy and foreign screw-ups, tampering of the Constitution, corruption at the highest echelons and apparent lack of respect from foreign powers ever since the demise of founding father Lee Kuan Yew”.

The letter was attributed to “Willy Sum”.

During the cross-examination by Deputy Public Prosecutor Senthilkumaran Sabapathy yesterday, Mr Sim testified through a Mandarin interpreter that he had shared the passwords to his Yahoo! and Gmail accounts with Mr De Costa, as he needed Mr De Costa’s assistance in writing and sending emails to government officials on his behalf.

Mr Sim, who was called as a witness by the prosecution, said that he was undergoing “bankruptcy proceedings and also problems with HDB and traffic summonses” issued against him at the time he had requested Mr De Costa’s help.

Other than the emails Mr Sim had requested Mr De Costa to write to appeal against the aforementioned issues, Mr Sim said that he was “very angry” about his email accounts being used to send emails on political matters.

“I treated him as a friend and asked him not to send messages or post anything to criticise government officers. I was also worried something might happen to him,” said Mr Sim.

It was found that such emails were sent over the course of more than 20 instances since 2011, with some published on TOC under different variations of Mr Sim’s name such as “WL Sum” and “Willy Sim”.

He said that despite discovering the emails he did not consent to being written and sent from his email accounts, he did not change his passwords or do anything else to stop Mr De Costa from using his email accounts as he still needed Mr De Costa’s assistance.

Mr Sim also testified that no one else had access to his email accounts and that it was very possible for Mr De Costa to have written them.

He similarly told police of the matter in November two years ago during investigations into the criminal defamation offence.

Mr Sim said that he was shocked when the police turned up at his house on the morning of 20 November 2018 and told him that they are investigating him for criminal defamation of the Cabinet members.

Police, however, found drugs at his residence in the search they conducted. Mr Sim was then charged for drug possession and jailed in February last year for a term of eight months.

Sim Wee Lee previously jailed for insurance fraud, involved in illegal gambling

The second day of the trial saw most of the reporters present yesterday missing from the court this morning.

Mr De Costa’s lawyer M Ravi today took his turn to cross-examine Mr Sim at the witness stand.

Mr Ravi had the witness to admit that he had been part of an insurance fraud case in 2008. In this case, Mr Sim was sentenced to around 7 months of imprisonment.

Mr Sim was also involved in illegal gambling around the same period.

The DPP asked to clarify what he had told Mr Ravi in response to the defence lawyer’s question on the actual characters in Mr Sim’s email address, whereby Mr Sim said “.” instead of “@”.

The court ordered the counsels to listen to the recording to make a determination.

Both counsels affirmed that Mr Sim had said “dot” and not “@” after the short break.

Mr Sim then confirmed that he had misspelt the email address in his answer to Mr Ravi.

Mr Ravi charged that Mr Sim had misspelt because it was Mr De Costa who helped with the creation of the email account.

Mr Sim was also confronted with an article published on TOC in 2008 about his problems with loan sharks.

While he agreed that the content was correct, Mr Sim stressed that he did not give permission for the article to be published on TOC, as it featured his name.

Mr Sim said that it is his belief that he would not have given permission for the publication as it is not glamorous to loan money from loan sharks.

However, upon further cross-examination by Mr Ravi, he later said that he may be unable to recall, as it may have been possible that an editor from TOC had called him up over the said article.

Background on Daniel De Costa’s criminal defamation case

Mr De Costa was arrested on 20 November 2018 under Section 499 of the Penal Code, which states that “whoever, by words either spoken or intended to be read, or by signs, or by visible representations, makes or publishes any imputation concerning any person, intending to harm, or knowing or having reason to believe that such imputation will harm, the reputation of such person, is said, except in the cases hereinafter excepted, to defame that person”.

He was subsequently charged on 12 December under the same Penal Code provision at State Courts the following day under Section 500 of the Penal Code for criminal defamation.

Mr De Costa was alleged to have sent an email titled “PAP MP apologises to SDP” on 4 September 2018 from [email protected], with the intention of having the contents of that email to be published on TOC using the pseudonym of “Willy Sum”.

Mr De Costa was additionally charged for committing an offence under the Computer Misuse Act of Singapore.

Published on 4 September 2018, the article submitted by Mr De Costa alleged that “we have seen multiple policy and foreign screw-ups, tampering of the Constitution, corruption at the highest echelons and apparent lack of respect from foreign powers ever since the demise of founding father Lee Kuan Yew”.

The offending article was taken down under the orders of Infocomms and Media Development Authority (IMDA) on 18 Sep 2018. IMDA then reported the article to the Singapore Police Force the following month on 8 October 2018.

On 20 November 2018, the police seized electronic devices from Mr De Costa’s and TOC chief editor Terry Xu’s respective residences under court orders.

Mr Xu was subjected to an eight-hour interview with the police on the day itself, while Mr De Costa was interviewed at a later date.

Under Section 500 of the Penal Code, those found guilty of criminal defamation may be subject to maximum sentence of two years’ imprisonment or a fine or both.

The hearing is adjourned to Thursday morning (29 October).

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