S’pore Lawyer Who Allegedly Molested Colleague Says Policeman Offered To Close Case

Something I didn’t realise is that Goody Feed has more than 100 articles with the search term “molest”.

In October, it’s about 8 articles, which is 2 per week.

We were about to set a record in November with no molestation cases, but I guess that’s broken again with this article.

And because the case involves a lawyer… I’m obliged to tell you about his grades. The lawyer himself graduated from law school with top honours from a local university. He previously worked at Drew & Napier where the allegations happened and is now working at another firm.

Let’s call him M (nothing to do with his real name since his identity is hidden for victim protection).

The case is still on trial (opened 11 November 2019 and to be continued), and we don’t know if that will have any effect yet. So let’s talk about what we know.

The Molestation Accusation

On 11 October 2017, M pressed his thigh against his colleague’s upper arm, then later, took a photo of her panties.

He is also accused of using his phone to take a photo of the colleague’s panties, her chest and bra in April 2017 in the office.

In total, that’s one count of molesting and three counts of insulting her modesty.

Naturally, he denied the accusations.

But… He Basically Confessed

You see, the investigating officer (IO), Thanabalan Kothandapani, apparently promised to close the case if he were to just make a confession, apologised, and then reveal where all the photographs were.

Normal criminals would be suspicious of this offer of course.

But not M. He gave the statements.

And since those statements were made in November 2017, he denied those statements he made when he was on trial on 11 November 2019.

Some other arguments were made about him being a lawyer and should have understood how this offer is problematic, but you can read the source for that.

Felt Suicidal

According to the man himself, the incident actually left him feeling suicidal.

“I was very distraught as this was the first time in my life that I was called up for police investigation and I was honestly very stunned by the fact that my best friend in the team would make the complaint against me.”

M apparently asked two friends for advice but wanted to end the matter quickly. So he called the IO on 13 November to accept the apology/confession offer.

He also claims that he did not have the photos on his phone.

“I wanted to do it in a way which would appease (the victim) and obviously I could not say that I did not take the photos.”

“I was quite foolish and I thought of downloading some photos from the internet and just submitting the photos, but I thought that it was too risky as she may recognise that that was not her.”

In the end, he decided to lie that he deleted the photos immediately.

Apology Emails To Colleague

When he went to make the confession on 14 November 2017, he saw a second female colleague at the police station, and feared that she would “blow things up”.

So he sent four emails as an apology.

Here are some of the things within the emails (not in order, since only snippets were given in the news):

“Please I have never done anything wrong in my life except for this one mistake, I treated everyone nicely and with my heart.”

“I can’t afford for this to blow up. I can resign and everything, but my family can’t know about this.”

“I am on the verge of taking my own life and it is just my friends who are keeping me alive.”

“I’ve always treated you sincerely and honestly save for the times when I was very stressed and I committed those mistakes. I didn’t keep any footage. I always deleted them within minutes (because) I will feel so guilty. Please please please have mercy on me.”

“I am here today to come clean. I think they will arrest me later. I’m sorry … I really loved the team”.

He also talked about his mother’s liver condition in the emails.

Although what the above seems like a confession to the molestation, the man disagreed.

The trial will continue on 12 November 2019.

And that’s your weekly S’pore molestation news.

But really, what’s causing all these random molestation cases?