On the evening of 17 October 2024, a cleaner named Tan Wei Sien was in the men’s toilet on level 1 at Causeway Point mall. A 16-year-old Secondary Four student, still in his school uniform, went into the biggest cubicle – the one with a handrail. The teen sat on the toilet seat, ate a packet of rice, and then started masturbating while watching inappropriate videos on his phone.
Suddenly, the boy saw a hand slide under the partition from the next cubicle. The hand copied the motion of masturbation, and the person asked him if he “wanted or not”. Looking at the reflection on the floor, the teen realised the other person was also masturbating. This left him feeling uneasy and uncomfortable.
The person even knocked on the boy’s cubicle door, but the teen said “no” a few times. Scared, the boy quickly recorded a short five-second video of the hand gesture. He later reported the sexual harassment on the National Anti-Violence and Sexual Harassment Helpline website.
The teen left the toilet but forgot his wallet. When he came back to get it, he spotted Tan still there, staring at him. The boy recognised Tan from his shoes and bag as the guy from the next cubicle. Feeling nervous, the teen went to another toilet to fix his belt. Tan followed him inside that second toilet too.
The boy took a photo of Tan washing his hands and ran off fast because he “didn’t want [Tan] to do anything to [him]”. Later in the mall, he saw Tan walking towards him, got panicked, walked quicker, and managed to lose him.
Police called the teen while he was still at Causeway Point and met him outside Burger King. He showed them the video and photo. Officers arrested Tan right there in the mall that night and took his phone.
On the phone, they found seven videos, each lasting 7 to 11 seconds. The clips showed the teen sitting on the toilet with his private parts exposed, touching himself. Tan had stood on the toilet bowl with bare feet and slowly moved his phone camera over the partition to film.
When police questioned Tan the next day, he explained he was in his cubicle when he heard someone toss a packet of rice onto the floor next door. He smelt food and thought it was “unusual and inappropriate for a toilet setting”. So he looked over the partition, saw the teen masturbating, and recorded it “to gather evidence of his act of masturbation”.
He said he reached under the partition to gesture and “inquire if he was masturbating”, and did it again before the boy put his trousers back on and left. After that, Tan followed the teen to see “if he would attempt to masturbate in another toilet” and “to determine if he would continue to litter”.
Tan admitted it was wrong to record the boy but insisted he just wanted proof of littering since he works as a cleaner and “feels strongly about cleanliness matters”. He added: “When I see someone acting irresponsibly by throwing food onto the ground, I feel angry about their behaviour, as they seem not to care about the cleaners who must clean up their mess.”
But District Judge Koo Zhi Xuan pointed out there was no sign of litter in any of the videos. They “deliberately focused” only on the victim and his private act. The judge said even if Tan suspected littering, there was “absolutely no reasonable cause” to take multiple videos of the teen while he was still doing a private act with his private part exposed, and to keep them on his phone afterwards – especially since nothing showed littering.
The judge called Tan a “shameless voyeur” who “unlawfully infringed upon the dignity and privacy of a 16-year-old student in a public toilet in an egregious and persistent manner”. This caused the victim “a considerable level of distress”. Tan showed “an utter lack of remorse and introspection” by denying wrongdoing despite clear evidence. Tan got six months in jail. He has appealed the decision and is out on bail now.
