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Storekeeper to do time under two-year-old laws protecting minors.
A 27-YEAR-OLD storekeeper yesterday became the first person here to do jail time for sexual grooming, under laws introduced two years ago to guard young people from sexual predators.
Loh Kuat Fung, from Sarawak in Malaysia, was jailed a year each on two charges accusing him of arranging to “meet a minor with the intention of committing a sexual offence with the minor”.
These sentences were ordered to run concurrently.
He will also have to serve another six months in prison for allowing one of his young victims to consume alcohol in a hotel room he rented.
The sexual grooming law was incorporated into the Penal Code in February 2008 to protect minors against sexual abuse. The worry was that predators were increasingly seeking out their victims online, to lure them into the real world for sex.
The law allowed for such predators to be nabbed before they succeeded in their attempt. Sex with a minor is a crime punishable with a jail term of up to 20 years, along with a fine or caning.
Loh did not have sex with the girls, although he did his best to do so.
He met one 15-year-old student through the social networking website Friendster some time in 2008.
He obtained her cellphone number and they met several times at a fitness centre near Upper Changi Road.
He wanted to have sex with the Indonesian girl, and would persistently steer their online chats and conversations to his sexual experiences. He did the same with her 13-year-old friend.
Yesterday, District Judge Sarjit Singh chided Loh for targeting victims who were “very vulnerable”, and ordered the 18-month jail term to start immediately.
The maximum penalty is a jail term of up to three years and a fine of up to $10,000.
Last week, when the storekeeper pleaded guilty, the court heard that Loh trawled websites to strike up conversations with young girls.
He would also view online pornographic films. Police found seven such movies on his computer in his room in a Hougang flat.
Loh tried every trick to get his victims into bed. When the 15-year-old girl told him that she liked alcohol, he warned her against drinking in public as she was underaged. He then offered to rent a room in a hotel so that she could drink to her heart’s content.
Some time in August or September 2008, he booked a room at the Cameron Hotel in Upper Changi Road, but she turned up with a male friend, identified in court documents only as Willie.
She came with a bottle of vodka. He brought the beer.
The girl became so drunk Willie had to call the girl’s maid to help her get home.
In the days that followed, Loh continued to harass her for sex. To get him off her back, she introduced a 13-year-old friend to him.
The plan backfired as he began hounding both of them.
Tired of his constant pestering, the two girls decided to meet Loh on Sept 29 in their school uniforms to make it clear that they were minors, in the hope that he would stop sexually harassing them.
Undeterred, Loh booked a room in the Cameron Hotel. When he tried to take them up to the room, the hotel receptionist, noticing that the girls were in school uniforms, stopped them.
The girls left but Loh did not give up. He continued pestering them for sex. The younger girl then confided in her teacher and made a police report on Oct 9.
During the sentencing, Loh, who looks younger than his age, kept his eyes averted from his aunt and his Malaysian girlfriend, 20, who was sobbing in the gallery. Both women declined to speak to The Straits Times.
His former landlord described Loh, who moved out last year, as polite and well-dressed.
Said the retiree, who wanted to be known only as Mr Wong: “He was always on the computer.”
