Man took obscene videos and photos of 33 men in public toilets of shopping malls

Colin Teo Han Jern, 27, used his mobile phone to capture obscene videos and photos of 33 men in public toilets without their knowledge.

Some of the images that the sales executive took showed his victims engaging in sexual acts while several others were of them defecating.

According to The Straits Times, nearly all his offences were committed at The Paragon and The Cathay shopping malls.

On March 8 last year, he went to a toilet at The Cathay and took videos of a man performing a sexual act in his cubicle beside his. He captured 32 obscene images of other men in public toilets after this incident.

Five months later, he went to a toilet at The Paragon and recorded videos of two men having sex in a cubicle.

He later went to a toilet in the same shopping mall on Sep 2 and snapped indecent pictures of 11 other men.

The Malaysian was caught red-handed on Sep 9, when he decided to record a video of a man who was inside a cubicle in a toilet at The Paragon shopping centre. Placing his mobile phone over the partition, Teo had angled it towards the man and captured photographs and videos of him.

The man spotted the device and snatched it away. He reported Teo to the mall's concierge and the police were alerted.

Teo was sentenced to 10 weeks' jail and a fine of $4,000 on Wednesday (Dec 6) after he pleaded guilty last month to five counts of making obscene films, four counts of being a public nuisance and one count of having an obscene film in his possession.

Thirty other charges for similar offences were taken into consideration during sentencing.

Teo's lawyer Chua Eng Hui asked District Judge Kenneth Yap to sentence his client to five weeks' jail and a fine instead.

Mr Chua said: "All the videos and photographs were solely for his own consumption. He took them as a form of escape and a way of coping with the stresses that he was experiencing at work and in his relationships with his family and friends."

On Wednesday, Deputy Public Prosecutor Yvonne Poon told the court that the prosecution may be appealing against the sentence and applied for Teo not to be sent to jail in the meantime.

The judge granted the application and Teo is now out on bail of $5,000. The prosecution will give its confirmation on its decision on filing an appeal on Dec 13. Teo will also be back in court on that day.

Offenders convicted of making an obscene video can be jailed for up to two years and fined between $20,000 and $40,000 for each charge.