News

Iris Koh Makes Police Report About Police Officers While Out on Bail

2022-02-07 , 1:00 pm

Just two days after Iris Koh, the founder of the anti-vaccine group called Healing the Divide, was granted bail at $20,000 after being remanded for police investigations for two weeks, she has decided to make a police report against the police officers.

Yes, your eyes are not fooling you, Koh actually went ahead and did that.

… For less-than-stellar reasons too.

Reasonings Behind the Police Report

After being released from police custody, Koh came to learn that her two assistants—Shang and Huang Feng—had their phones and computers seized by the police for investigation.

At the end of the Telegram message, she asks for at least four people to accompany her as witnesses to support her in the police reports.

In the video, Koh states that those electronic devices contain privileged information between them and their lawyers, the potential witnesses, as well as the plaintiffs of the various lawsuits that her organisation has filed, and the criminal case that she is currently being investigated for.

When she called her Investigation Officer Ho and contacted the police to tell them to “stop prowling through our phones and the messages”, they were summarily ignored.

The police simply told them that they had to contact their lawyers first, but Iris Koh believes that it would already be too late once she contacts the lawyers to negotiate the matter with the authorities, since the damage would have been done.

Can I ask what damages they are, perhaps damages to the already sordid reputation of your Non-Profit Organisation (NGO) and their unlawful dealings of “goods and services”?

Therefore, she decided to personally go down to the Police Cantonment, whilst asking for a few more witnesses/supporters.

Secondly, Koh also wants to file a report against the police for frightening and scaring her volunteers and staff, stating that the police even went as far as threatening her assistant Shang and volunteers by saying that what they were doing was “illegal”, in order to induce statements out of them.

She demands that the police stop their bullying ways, to obey the law, and stop searching through their phones and computers because she believes it is not in their right.

The Second Telegram Message at Police Cantonment Road

True to her words, in the late night of the same day (6 Feb), Iris Koh and her husband were seen filming next to the roadside as they waited for their fellow witnesses.

She reiterates the points that she previously mentioned in the first video, albeit more rushed and anxious sounding.

If you are interested in watching the videos, you can go onto Healing the Divide’s Telegram group to look at it yourself.

Don’t worry, you don’t have to join the group in order to view the contents, nor has the group been made private.

The Legalities of a Police Investigation

First and foremost, let’s go through the typical investigative process in Singapore before unravelling the flaws in Iris Koh’s arguments.

In most cases, a police investigation involves four steps:

Receiving the first information report of the crime
Conducting interviews and recording statements
The gathering of evidence
Referring the case to the Attorney-General’s Chambers

Judging from the actions that the police has recently taken against Koh’s assistants, it can be assumed that they have already moved on to Step 3.

Herein lies the main question: is it legal for the police to seize and search through electronic devices?

In general, a search warrant might be issued by the court if it considers that a search or inspection will serve the purposes of justice.

A search warrant grants the authorised individual to search and/or seize things, goods, documents, property, or persons, in the midst of an investigation in connection to the offence.

Police officers might also be allowed to search a place without a search warrant in some instances:

If the police officer has grounds to believe that the property will be removed before the search warrant is obtained
During the investigation of an arrestable offence, the police deems that an inspection is necessary, especially if the person in possession of the item is unlikely to give it, or they have enough reason to believe that the thing that needs to be searched will be removed before they actually find it

How a Search Warrant Should Be Conducted

If a search warrant has been issued, the entry and search must be conducted during the period specified in the warrant.

The occupier of the place must be present during the execution of the search, and the authorised person with the warrant must identify themselves to the occupier, whilst showing documentary evidence that they are a police officer.

After executing the search, the police officer must submit a comprehensive list of things that were seized.

The items seized will usually be involved in an offence suspected to be committed, or used to commit the crime, and can thereby be suspected to constitute as evidence of an offence.

The aggrieved person (the occupier) is allowed to make the court suspend and cancel the search by making a police report for trespassing or the usage of criminal force.

It is also within the rights of the accused to request a copy of the search warrant to read the specifics of it.

The Tally of Iris Koh’s Charges

Thus far, several arrestable charges have been laid against Iris Koh.

The first being her conspiracy with Doctor Jipson Quah and his assistant Chua Cheng Soon Thomas for submitting false information to the National Immunisation Registry to obtain Certificates of Vaccination when their clients had not been vaccinated with the Sinopharm Vaccine.

This was later worsened when investigations revealed that at least 20 people were referred to Quah instead of the initial assumption of eight.

The second charge that she is being accused of is for instigating her group to flood and overwhelm the COVID-19 public hotlines, which is considered a public health risk as it hinders the nation’s fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

The last and most recent charge is for obstructing a public servant in the discharge of their public functions when she tore up the two police statements after they were read to her during her detainment in police custody.

To be honest, I’m surprised that she wasn’t slapped with a charge for general obstruction of justice, considering how appalling her conduct had been during the investigation.

Tenability of Iris Koh’s Police Reports

It should be noted that in the transcripts of her two videos leading up to the police reports, Iris Koh has made no mention of whether there was a search warrant involved.

If a search warrant was issued, then Iris Koh has no grounds to stand on, and her Investigation Officer is not wrong for brushing off her demands and telling her to contact her lawyers instead.

With an issued search warrant, it is within the police’s rights to search and seize any property or device that they believe will assist in the investigation and the gathering of the evidence.

Considering how the first two charges that Iris Koh is facing involves possible correspondences with the clients to refer them to Jipson Quah, and that she is under investigation for organising the mass flooding of the COVID-19 public hotlines, electronic devices are definitely in the list of things that will be confiscated.

The “privileged information” that Koh speaks of might just be the evidence that will stand against her, which would support the exigency of wanting to seal up the electronic devices and stop the authorities’ perusal of them.

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Next, the police’s supposed threats against her volunteers and staff, stating that their actions are illegal.

The answer for that is pretty simple: yes, it is illegal to abet the accused in the conspiracy of submitting false information and actively jamming up the public hotlines.

It can sound threatening, especially when it’s coming from a police officer, but those are also objective facts.

Under Section 177 of the Penal Code, an individual is legally bound to provide information to the authorities, but should they knowingly offer false information instead, they are liable to a fine of up to $5000, a jail term of 6 months, or both.

While the veracity of Inspector Ho’s “inducement” or “frightening” tactics to extract statements out of her assistants and volunteers, or what had been admitted, is unknown, putting suspected individuals under pressure is not unheard of, or uncommon.

Whether it breaches the line of verbal or physical abuse, instead of just being an interrogation, that goes from case to case, but police officers tend to know better than to cross the line.

The Flawed Side of Koh’s Story

Besides Koh’s fervent desire to make the police reports, she makes light of the situation in the first video.

Rather than admitting that her main offence is the assisting of submitting false information to the Ministry of Health (MOH), she merely said: “Come on, if the PET tests are illegal, we are just victims. We are clients of the clinic, they told us it can be done so that’s why we did it. Okay, so in what way is it illegal?”

The “PET Tests” Koh refers to is a “Pre-Event Test” which is a COVID-19 test taken by an attendee or patron who wishes to enter a venue where selected events, businesses, or activities are being held.

Participants must prove that they have a valid negative COVID-19 test result taken within a specified period before they are allowed entry.

But that is not the main crux of her charges.

Her first and main charge are the attempts to get false certifications of vaccination which can pose a huge health risk because unvaccinated people are more likely to get infected and spread COVID-19.

It is not just about preemptive testing before large events, and the tests showing negative results, which allow the participant access to the event.

Unless, of course, her list of crimes include stating the Antigen Rapid Test (ART) or Polymerase Chain (PCR) Test showed a negative result when it was positive.

Her crime is intentionally creating holes for anti-vaxxers and unvaccinated people to slip through, when mandatory vaccinations are meant to be safeguards and shields against COVID-19.

And before accusing the police of bullying and obstructing justice, perhaps Koh should reflect on her own behaviour first before arbitrarily tossing out such statements like she’s wholly innocent.

The refusal to cooperate with local authorities, filing a report against her investigative officer for two hours instead of aiding the investigation, tearing up the police statements, refusing medical assessments when offered, and refusing to be discharged when she’s medically fit–

Those are acts of obstruction of justice.

That is deliberate tyranny. Koh was aware that she possesses the information necessary to push forward the investigation since she is the head of her organisation, but actively chose to withhold said information with excuses and by being a general nuisance.

Conclusions to Koh’s Complaints

Generally speaking, it feels like Iris Koh has already found herself in a hole of her own making, and she is somehow managing to dig a deeper one with her bare hands.

Ms Koh, you were literally just granted bail two days ago at a hefty sum of $20,000, which has no doubt caused a bit of financial strain.

Since her police report filings happened late at night yesterday, there hasn’t been any news regarding what came out of those reports, nor has the Healing the Divide channel been updated with more news.

Plus, judging from Iris Koh’s recent Facebook post, she isn’t done spreading more of her deluded beliefs against vaccinations yet.

In her own words, “I maintain that I am innocent, I did not know about what was going on between Doctor and patients and will assist the police in their investigations.”

Amazing, it’s the exact opposite of what her accomplices Quah and Chua said, since they told the local authorities that they were following instructions instead of being the actual culprits in wanting to submit the false information.

At the end of her post, she writes, “I thanks all who didn’t purely believe in the nonsense from the media and I will be addressing some of their wild claims and propaganda later.

In the meantime for those who don’t wish to take the booster jabs to keep your jobs come Deb 15, welcome to join us on the Other Side of the Vaccine Story.”

Dear readers, please don’t join her on the dark side.

There are no cookies, only misguided beliefs that vaccines are harmful.

Koh believes that differentiating individuals by the their vaccination status is wrong, but she completely fails to comprehend that those unvaccinated without an eligible reason pose a greater health risk to general public.

And when Iris Koh eventually gets around to addressing the supposed propaganda and campaign against her, it will certainly be a spectacle to watch.