'I'm a gangsta': Reoffender swaggering in police station on TikTok had assaulted uncle and fiancee

Shaffiq Alkhatib
The Straits Times
March 19, 2024

A man who was released from prison under a remission order in September 2022 reoffended about nine months later when he burned his fiancee’s right forearm with a hair straightener.

As part of the order, recalcitrant offender Mohd Heirizal Kamarzaman, 42, who had been in and out of jail for offences including assaulting his uncle in 2019, was supposed to keep himself out of trouble from Sept 10, 2022, to May 20, 2024.

Instead, he assaulted Siti Zulaika A. Rahman in June 2023 before taking part in unlawful video recordings at the Police Cantonment Complex (PCC) in July and August that year.

The PCC is defined as a protected area under the Infrastructure Protection Act.

Among other things, Heirizal uploaded one of the videos on his TikTok account and set it to a portion of an expletive-laden song criticising the police.

On March 19, he pleaded guilty to two counts of making a video recording at the PCC and one count of assault.

Siti, then 33, who had disregarded multiple signs and also recorded videos of him there, was sentenced to a week in jail in November 2023.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Sarah Siaw told the court that the couple met in September 2022, and Heirizal moved into Siti’s flat after they began a romantic relationship.

The engaged couple started quarrelling a few months later as he believed she had hacked into his phone and bugged the unit. During some of these disputes, Heirizal would slap and kick Siti, the court heard.

She was preparing to leave the flat on June 19, 2023, and was heating her hair straightener when she got into a tiff with him.

DPP Siaw said: “During the dispute, Siti pulled the accused’s hair. The accused then took Siti’s heated hair straightener and clamped her right forearm with it... Siti immediately shouted and pulled her arm away.”

Ten days later, her parents took her to the PCC to lodge a police report, and she went to the Singapore General Hospital later.

Court documents did not state what happened next, but on July 13, 2023, Heirizal went to the Central Police Division at the PCC for bail-related matters. Siti accompanied him there and waited near the front desk.

After the bail reporting process ended at around 10.20am, he sent her a text message to tell her he was about to come out.

Siti then used her phone to record a 17-second video of Heirizal making an obscene sign while he swaggered through a glass door.

She sent the clip to him and he uploaded it on his TikTok account. Heirizal also set the video to a song titled I’m A Gangsta.

The couple returned to the PCC at around 10.20am on Aug 1, 2023.

DPP Siaw said: “While the accused was processing his bail reporting... he used his phone to film a video of the counter desk, capturing a female counter officer’s face and (a sign stating) ‘Police – Warrant Enforcement Unit’ behind her.”

Heirizal later passed his phone to Siti, and she used it to film a video of him from the back as they were walking towards an exit of the PCC building.

He knew he was being filmed and exaggerated his movements for the camera. He later stitched together the two videos, which were recorded on that day, and uploaded the clip on TikTok.

Heirizal also set it to a portion of the expletive-laden song.

On March 19, DPP Siaw said that all the videos garnered more than 300 reactions and over 130 shares.

Stressing that Heirizal had publicly glamorised his disdain for the law, she added: “Had the videos not been deleted from his TikTok account on Aug 4, 2023, in the presence of the police, they would likely have gained even wider traction.”

He is expected to be sentenced on April 23.