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Man gets jail after Interpol tip-off about online child sexual abuse material
He downloaded the illicit material from links found on the Sammyboy forum.
Koh Liang Chek James arriving at the State Courts on May 29, 2025. (Photo: CNA/Lim Li Ting)
Davina Tham
29 May 2025 06:09PM
SINGAPORE: A man has been sentenced to 15 months' jail for possessing hundreds of child sexual abuse images and videos, following a police operation based on an Interpol tip-off.
Koh Liang Chek James, 33, pleaded guilty on Thursday (May 29) to a single charge of possessing child sexual abuse material.
On Oct 4, 2021, the Singapore Police Force launched an operation to arrest suspects who had dealt with child sexual abuse material on the Mega cloud storage service.
This was based on information from Interpol's unit for crimes against children.
Koh, then a digital marketer, was arrested the next day. He was the holder of an email address that operated an account on Mega.
About five to six years earlier, Koh learnt about Mega through the Sammyboy forum, where users commonly share pornographic and child sexual abuse material, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Chan Yi Cheng.
Koh created a Mega account with his email address and used it to download sexually explicit material from the cloud through links he found on Sammyboy.
When police seized his phone during the arrest, they found 467 photos and eight videos depicting child sexual abuse.
The prosecution asked for 15 to 17 months' jail, with Mr Chan stressing the lengthy period of offending.
He pointed out that Koh's actions directly harmed the children depicted, and also caused wider harm by creating demand as a consumer of child sexual abuse material.
Mr Chan noted, however, that Koh downloaded the photos and videos for himself, and there was no evidence he distributed or profited from them.
Defence lawyer Danny Nah said Koh recognised his wrongdoing, underwent counselling, and had since turned to exercise and photography to curb his urges to view sexually explicit material.
In deliberating on the sentence, District Judge Paul Chan observed that the volume of illicit material found in Koh’s possession was among the highest seen in such cases.
Koh will start serving his sentence on Jun 12, after a deferment to settle personal matters. He remains out on bail of S$10,000.
