Stalker jailed for posing as surveyor, obtaining personal information of more than 500 female students
Fong Poh Kuen would claim he was conducting an education survey and record the female students with spy-cam spectacles or his phone.
SINGAPORE: While posing as an education surveyor, a man would don a pair of black spectacles with pinhole cameras to record female students while collecting personal information about them.
In total, Fong Poh Kuen obtained the personal information of more than 500 students.
For his offences, the 46-year-old was sentenced to 18 months’ jail on Wednesday (Aug 30).
Fong had previously been convicted in 2019 for harassment, among other offences, and sentenced to three months’ jail.
Other than using the spy-cam spectacles, Fong would also place his mobile phone in his breast pocket facing outward or hold it in his hand at chest height to record the students. He would then hide the photos and videos in a password-encrypted mobile application disguised as a calculator application.
The spyglasses were bought by Fong after he was released from prison following his 2019 conviction.
To collect the personal information of female students, Fong would prepare multiple education survey forms and position himself near educational institutions before approaching them to fill in the forms, focusing on those wearing school uniforms.
When asked about the purpose of the survey, Fong would tell the students that he represented an educational institution or government body to deceive them into believing that he was authorised to conduct the surveys. The students would then be induced to provide him with their personal information.
He would often wear the spyglasses with the video-recording function turned on while conducting such surveys.
Once Fong obtained the personal information, he would use it to stalk the students by repeatedly sending them text messages, keeping them under surveillance or both.
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In one incident in November 2019, Fong approached a student wearing a junior college school uniform while she was having breakfast, and asked if she was applying to university soon and to fill in the survey form.The student, who was 19 years old at the time, provided her personal information and university courses that she intended to apply for at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and the National University of Singapore after Fong told her that he was an NTU student.
From Mar 21 to Jun 6 in 2020, Fong repeatedly sent messages to the victim, asking her about the outcome of her university applications.
She initially responded, but stopped replying after she grew suspicious. But Fong continued to send messages even after she stopped responding.
As Fong was aware that the victim had applied to NTU, he would use his alumni account to check if she had been registered in the university’s email system, which contained a directory of its students’ names, email addresses, and user IDs.
He then found the victim’s user ID from the directory and sent her a text message that he knew she would be attending the university, and that he knew her user ID.
She asked him for his name but he declined to provide it. She then made a police report.
Another victim, whom Fong approached in April 2017, was told by him that he was a student from Singapore Management University and was conducting an education survey.
The 23-year-old woman at the time of the incident believed him and filled in the survey with her personal information. Fong then retained the victim’s contact for two months before sending her a message in June 2017.
As the victim felt distressed and suspicious of Fong’s actions, she began noting down when she encountered him subsequently after, and recorded a total of 10 incidents between 2017 and 2021 where she noticed Fong loitering near tertiary education institutions or using his mobile phone to take pictures or videos of women.
After she filed a police report following an incident on Apr 8, 2021, Fong admitted to the police during investigations that he would perform such recordings every other day while on the way to work.
LOITERING, FILMING FEMALE STUDENTS
In Aug 28, 2020, Fong was caught loitering in the vicinity of Dunman High School at the bus stop near Mountbatten MRT station by multiple students, who then informed the school’s discipline master of his behaviour. Fong was filming the female students with his mobile phone.This was not Fong’s first time filming students from Dunman High School, with the latest incident taking place on Aug 15 this year. He was also similarly convicted for the same action in 2019.
In another incident on Mar 9, 2022, Fong was in the vicinity of the bus stop opposite Tampines Meridian Junior College (TMJC), where he was filming students using his mobile phone at chest height.
Prior to this, Fong also engaged in harassing behaviour against TMJC’s students on five other occasions.
After the school’s discipline master was informed by a female student, the school told all its students and their parents to take precautions when entering or leaving the school. The school also set up a practice for students to leave in pairs or groups.
On two separate occasions in August 2022, Fong mainly recorded female students at NTU during freshman orientation activities using his mobile phone and spyglasses.
Fong was eventually arrested and remanded on Aug 31, 2022. On Aug 29 this year, he pleaded guilty to 13 charges, including multiple counts of illegally obtaining personal information; causing harassment, alarm or distress; and unlawful stalking.
Court documents stated that police officers spent more than 600 hours investigating the case, while noting Fong's lack of cooperation with the authorities.
