From the Breaking News section of The Straits Times Online, 3rd Jan, 2012:
A man who paid $100 for sex with an underage Vietnamese prostitute was jailed for nine months on Tuesday.
Kum Chin Tiong, 57, then a land and estate executive with the Singapore Land Authority, pleaded guilty to having commercial sex with the 16-year-old sex worker at Meng Yew Hotel in Geylang in July 2011.
A district court head that Kum was at a pub in Joo Chiat Road in mid-July when the Vietnamese girl approached him. She told him she was 20 years old but he disbelieved her as she looked younger than that. She also refused to let him see her passport.
Despite that, he asked her for sexual services. The girl, who is now 17, quoted $100 for ‘short-time’ sex. They exchanged contact numbers.
In end-July, she called him on the phone. Subsequently, he met her at her lodging house, and they took a cab to the hotel where he paid her $100 for her services.
Kum, who has two children and whose divorce is pending, could have been jailed for up to seven years and/or fined for commercial sex with a person below 18 years old.
Does anyone else besides me see an unfairness in this and similar cases?
There is something radically wrong when the age of consent for sex is 16 but it is an offence to have paid sex with someone below 18.
Also, how is someone supposed to tell if a sex worker is below 18? Sometimes it is obvious; but often it is not.
Rather than a relatively long custodial sentence, a fine would have been more appropriate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
goodpartner
It’s the LAW lah, where got fair or unfair one? Someone up there decided to raise it to 18, then it’s 18 lor. What can we do? …
Laws are made by men. No man is perfect. Therefore our laws are not perfect too. Many laws are good. But some laws are inherently unjust. Some laws are arguably unfair. That is why laws are sometimes changed or even expunged.
When citizens feel that a law is unfair, they should speak up about it. If the feeling of unfairness is widespread enough, it may be sufficient to overturn the law.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
goodpartner
Okie then it’s an issue with the lack of leadership to run a petition? Hmm… who will take the lead?
Talk of a petition is premature. I am just trying to gauge the feelings of people over here. I feel this particular law is unfair. Do many people feel the same way – not just within this forum but outside it too? If the level of perception that the law is unfair is indeed significant, then the next step could be considered. It need not be a petition – there are many possible measures that could be explored. But I would prefer to cross the bridge only when it needs to be crossed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
callmebad
when comes to matter of law, right or wrong, we have not much say.
government will also seldom bother to explain this to us
…
The government will be very happy if everyone thinks this way. But this is not true, of course. If enough people are outraged by an issue, the government will feel the pressure to do something about it. Take the flood and the MRT breakdowns for instance.
But when the government feels that the level of outrage is not likely to be high, they may just ignore the negative sentiment. The mandatory death penalty is an example of such an issue.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
goodpartner
Okie, first of all…are you referring to the “unfairness” of guys being somehow misled by the WL into thinking she is 18yo & above, OR the “unfairness” of the law to raise the legal age from 16 to 18?
I got the impression you’re referring to the latter, but let’s clarify before casting votes
Imho, EVERYONE will probably vote for it being unfair in the formal case where the WL cheated on her age resulting in guy getting jailed - so there’s no need for any poll.
However, given the temptation then, chances are that the guy will “act blur” even given strong suspicion as in the news; the guy think that he can get away by acting blur and push the blame on the WL for cheating him if ever got caught… so I don’t think he can claim “unfair” in this case.
I think there’s a judgement where it’s something like “if you know it’s wrong and did not do anything to prevent it, then it’s enough justification put you at fault” or “if you’re experiencd enough or in a position to tell that it’s wrong, but choose to ignore it, then you’re at fault too”.
I think the law is unfair in the first instance, and inconsistent in the second. But I do acknowledge that many countries have such anomalous laws in which the age of consent is lower than that for paid sex being illegal. The intent is probably to prevent young people from becoming sex workers. But it still seems logically contradictory that young people (above 16) are permitted to have sex but young people (below 18) are not permitted to have sex if money is involved.
For this particular case, no force or violence was used. The girl solicited and did not reveal her age. I just feel that the 9 months jail sentence is manifestly excessive.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Eternal Luck
I simply wont touch any gals even if they are stated as 18 years old. Not worth the risk.
What if a gal says she is 20? So you still won’t touch her? What if she is only 17 in actuality? The point is, how will you know?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Krazzie
Firstly, he can be jailed up to 7 years (7 x 12 months = 84 months) instead he gets 9 months roughly about 10% of the potential jail sentence. So which part of the sentence is excessive?
Secondly, the guy himself don’t believed the girl yet still go ahead and bonk her when there are so many alternatives, who to blame?
From what I can see the only reason it feels unjust is that a man lost his job, family and got jailed for something that is not his fault, but to me he is an idiot who took the risk and got caught for it.
My mata friend always tell me “Ignorance of the law doesn’t mean innocent” and this guy can’t even claim he is ignorant of the law.
It is extremely common for judges to pass custodial sentences which are a small percentage of the maximum allowed. That cannot be used to judge whether the sentence was excessive or otherwise.
Is the man actually a criminal who deserves to be locked up for nine months? That is the more pertinent question to ask. Yes, he may be stupid – is that a crime? Who is the victim here? What actual harm has been done?
It is true that a law has been breached. But seeing that the damage is minimal (the gal is a sex worker… she has therefore given her consent to sex, and she is above 16), don’t you think a fine would be more appropriate? Well, at least that is from my perspective.
Truth be told, anyone who visits sex workers could find themselves in his position because seldom do the ladies show their passports or identification papers to clients.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Amsterdam101
Would it make you feel better if the age of consent is raised to 18 also, making it ‘fair and consistent?’
It’s not about making me happy but it is an issue of public interest. But no, it wouldn’t be satisfactory to raise the age of consent to 18 because young people are maturing earlier, not later, these days. In other words, they should be allowed to have sex at an earlier, rather than a later, age.
What would seem more rational is to simply strike out the under-18 prohibition entirely. If someone is judged to be mature enough to be able to give or withhold sexual consent at 16, that consent is all that matters, whether or not money is involved.
It is normal for most men to want to have sex with youthful women. We are genetically biased to lust for young sex partners because youth is closely associated with fecundity.
One is considered a pedophile only if one wishes to take sexual advantage of children. That’s where the age of consent becomes relevant. For many countries, it is typically 16… sometimes slightly lower. Young people above the age of consent are no longer considered as children.
Under current Singapore law, any one could have sex with anyone else so long as both are above 16 – and so long as no money is involved. If money is involved, then it becomes a sex-worker / client transaction, and the minimum age of the sex worker is 18.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
asdfghjkl
note that the 18 year old commercial sex law does not apply to guys!
The sex of the sex worker is not specified in the Singapore Penal Code:
“376B.—(1) Any person who obtains for consideration the sexual services of a person, who is under 18 years of age, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to 7 years, or with fine, or with both.”