Man from Wuhan Who Lied to MOH Has Been to Multiple Hotels But Claimed Otherwise

Remember back in the days when the only COVID-19 cases were imported cases, and every single case has a background?

Those were good days when we could see our Tinder dates’ faces without being catfished. And those were the days when we didn’t know the severity of breaking any COVID-19 rules.

And it turns out that this is one of the defences implied by the very first few cases of COVID-19 who lied to MOH officers.

Background of the Infamous Couple

Lest you’ve forgotten, back in on 22 Jan 2020, Mr Hu Jun arrived in Singapore.

The very first case of COVID-19 was only announced on 23 January 2020, a day after Hu Jun landed on Singapore.

He later tested positive for COVID-19 on 31 Jan, but that didn’t end: he allegedly gave false information to a health officer about his whereabouts from 22 Jan to 29 Jan.

It was previously unknown when he had been to, but he’s said that he had been in a car to The Loft@Nathan, a condominium that his wife lives. According to him, he had stayed in the apartment on 22 January 2020, and had dinner with a friend that evening in the Orchard Rendezvous Hotel.

He had his symptoms the next day, but still went for a walk on 24 January 2020.

He then claimed that between 24 January to 29 January, he stayed in a friend’s empty house to isolate himself from his family members due to his fever.

What a noble guy.

And on 29 January, his wife drove him to Singapore General Hospital, and the rest is history.

Except that history is written by him and not by reality.

It turned out that on the day he arrived in Singapore, he had allegedly gone to Long Beach Seafood@Stevens in Stevens Road at 12.52pm, and went to Marina One Residences later that day at 3.37pm.

Marina One Residences is, well, a luxury condo in Marina Way.

But that’s not all.

On 24 January 2020, he is also accused of going to the Chinese embassy in Tanglin Road at 10am, and Ngee Ann City at 11:15am.

But wait; there’s more.

He then allegedly went to the Intercontinental Singapore Hotel that evening.

And of course there’s more.

On 28 January, a day before he was hospitalised, he’s also accused of making a trip to Studio M Hotel at 12:30pm.

Such a busy man with so many business meetings in places with beds, eh?

Objections Before Trial

Lest you didn’t know because you’ve not downloaded our app to read the latest articles, the couple was okay to pleading guilty, but with a condition: they don’t go to jail and only given a fine. If the prosecution calls for jail time, then they will not plead guilty.

Last I know, it’s even easier to negotiable with a cat than to negotiable with the prosecution, and so here they are today, attending a trial because the prosecutor is definitely going to ask for jail time.

After all, someone was jailed for having Bak Kut Teh while on Stay-Home-Notice.

But here’s the thing: his lawyer objected to a few points before the trial begins.

The first is that the charges for the fake statements made were before the period when COVID-19 was included under the Infectious Diseases Act. COVID-19, which was nameless then, was added on 29 January 2020.

Wait, so it’s okay to lie because the law isn’t there yet?

But if there’s one thing you learn from Korean dra—I mean, from the news reports in the last few months, you’d know that the prosecutors aren’t going to let this kind of trickery get in the way of justice.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Timotheus Koh agreed with that statement because it’s real what, but he added, “Essentially what the health officers were looking for were contacts, locations, that the accused persons had travelled to before the disease was scheduled … to prevent the now-scheduled disease from becoming a pandemic.

“So they are not entitled, your honour, to withhold information as to the dates that were before the scheduling of this disease … so in this regard, my learned friend misunderstands the provision of the Infectious Diseases Act.”

If it’s chim, let me rephrase it in Goody Feed lingo:

The second objection raised by the defence lawyer is that there could have been misunderstanding in communication because the Mandarin spoken in China and Singapore is “vastly different”.

And the cool prosecutor said he has proof and will be calling all the relevant witness to show that nothing was lost in translation.

The judge then dismissed the defence’s objections, saying there were no merits to them.

Or in other words…

Moral of the story?

No, not yet; the trial is still ongoing, so download our app and you won’t miss any exciting development.