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lauhunku
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Aug 2, 2011
18 years' jail, 24 strokes for serial robber
He broke into flat, took woman's valuables and sexually assaulted her
By Selina Lum
Lim Chee Cheong, 46, entered the flat while the victim and her child were asleep. He has past convictions for theft and housebreaking.
EARLY one morning in July last year, a 44-year-old woman secured the window grilles of her flat with cable ties and went to sleep with her four-year-old daughter.
She was rudely awoken later when she felt a sharp object pressed to her neck. A knife-wielding stranger was sitting on her bed.
Blindfolded and bound, she was not only robbed of her belongings but also sexually assaulted for 30 to 40 minutes.
Yesterday, her attacker, unemployed 46-year-old Lim Chee Cheong, was sentenced to 18 years' preventive detention and the maximum 24 strokes of the cane.
Preventive detention, which ranges from seven to 20 years, is meted out to repeat offenders and does not offer the usual one-third remission for good behaviour.
Lim, who has past convictions for theft and housebreaking, had pleaded guilty to one charge each of armed robbery, housebreaking and theft by night and sexual assault.
Read the full story in Tuesday's edition of The Straits Times.
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