If I understood what happened to me in interrogation correctly, after this morning’s interrogation there are now *more* offences that Rocky Howe and I are on the hook for. Just going to sum it up as best I can…
The original 2 alleged offences that we were questioned for this morning were:
(1) when 4 of us hung out outside Changi Prison chatting the night of Kahar was executed, and
(2) when we took photos outside of prison a couple of nights before Nagen was hanged.
However, ‘cos Rocky and I were wearing (different) T-shirts with anti-death penalty slogans today, the police claim that we have committed another offence of “illegal procession”, because we walked from the market across the street to the police station this morning.
For this, they confiscated the shirts off our backs (I’m not kidding). Soh Lung Teo, who was waiting for us, had to go to the market and buy us new shirts so that we could change and surrender our T-shirts before we could be released.
They also seized our phones and got us to unlock our phones for them. I agreed to surrender my phone.
BUT THEN…
One of the officers—who identified himself as from the cybercrimes response team—then also demanded that I surrender my social media accounts (FB, IG, Twitter) and give them the passwords and not use these accounts until their investigation is over (whenever that might be).
This was *after* I had already surrendered my phone, and they had gone through it in front of me and observed that I had logged out of apps like Facebook, and uninstalled apps like Twitter and Instagram.
As a journalist with a responsibility towards the people I am in contact with, as well as serious concerns about privacy and digital security, I was not comfortable and not prepared to surrender my passwords. So I refused.
I am told that this means Section 39(3) of the Criminal Procedure Code—to do with obstruction—might come into play. I was informed that the penalty for this is a fine of up to S$5,000, or imprisonment for up to 6 months, or both.
So in a nutshell, this morning I walked into the police station to be investigated for two incidents/“offences”, and might have walked out of it with double the number of problems.
According to my notes, my interrogation started at 10:53am, and we were released at 1:49pm.
https://www.facebook.com/kixes
The original 2 alleged offences that we were questioned for this morning were:
(1) when 4 of us hung out outside Changi Prison chatting the night of Kahar was executed, and
(2) when we took photos outside of prison a couple of nights before Nagen was hanged.
However, ‘cos Rocky and I were wearing (different) T-shirts with anti-death penalty slogans today, the police claim that we have committed another offence of “illegal procession”, because we walked from the market across the street to the police station this morning.
For this, they confiscated the shirts off our backs (I’m not kidding). Soh Lung Teo, who was waiting for us, had to go to the market and buy us new shirts so that we could change and surrender our T-shirts before we could be released.
They also seized our phones and got us to unlock our phones for them. I agreed to surrender my phone.
BUT THEN…
One of the officers—who identified himself as from the cybercrimes response team—then also demanded that I surrender my social media accounts (FB, IG, Twitter) and give them the passwords and not use these accounts until their investigation is over (whenever that might be).
This was *after* I had already surrendered my phone, and they had gone through it in front of me and observed that I had logged out of apps like Facebook, and uninstalled apps like Twitter and Instagram.
As a journalist with a responsibility towards the people I am in contact with, as well as serious concerns about privacy and digital security, I was not comfortable and not prepared to surrender my passwords. So I refused.
I am told that this means Section 39(3) of the Criminal Procedure Code—to do with obstruction—might come into play. I was informed that the penalty for this is a fine of up to S$5,000, or imprisonment for up to 6 months, or both.
So in a nutshell, this morning I walked into the police station to be investigated for two incidents/“offences”, and might have walked out of it with double the number of problems.
According to my notes, my interrogation started at 10:53am, and we were released at 1:49pm.
https://www.facebook.com/kixes
