Jail, caning for man who pulled knife on stranger, bit cop
A man pulled a knife on a stranger at a shop on the ground level of a Housing Board block because he thought the stranger was staring at him.
The same man later bit a police officer during arrest, believing he was being treated unjustly.
On Sept 25, Yoji Amashiro pleaded guilty to one count of possession of a weapon in public and one charge of causing hurt to a public servant.
Amashiro, 30, was sentenced to a year and 120 days’ jail along with six strokes of the cane.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Hidayat Amir said Amashiro, a Singapore national, was at a shop located at Buangkok Link at around 6pm on March 29.
At the same time, a 35-year-old man had just collected a parcel at the shop and was talking to an employee there.
As Amashiro was leaving the shop, he felt that the man was staring at him. He then pulled out a flip knife with a 6.5cm-long blade and pointed it at the man, asking him “if he had a problem”.
The man shook his head and said “no”, to which Amashiro replied “good” before leaving the store.
The man called the police to report the incident.
Police Sergeant Muhammad Yusuf Abdul Wahab responded to the call and arrived at Buangkok Square Park around 6.50pm.
Sgt Yusuf and six other officers spotted Amashiro and went to his flat unit to speak with him.
Court documents did not reveal where Amashiro was at the time he was spotted.
As the officers were interviewing him, DPP Amir said Amashiro started screaming and gesticulating angrily at the officers.
Five officers proceeded to restrain Amashiro who was struggling and resisting. Sgt Yusuf held onto Amashiro’s head to control him but Amashiro turned and bit the officer’s right index finger.
The sergeant pulled his hand away from Amashiro’s mouth, handcuffed and arrested him.
In his sentencing submissions, the prosecutor said Amashiro had threatened a stranger with a knife because he believed the man was staring at him, showing his cavalier attitude towards using a knife as a weapon.
Further, he said Amashiro had previously been sentenced to four weeks’ jail in July 2019, after he was caught armed with a foldable knife with a 5cm-long blade.
He also disagreed with Amashiro’s lawyer, Ms Azeera Ali from the Public Defender’s Office, that the bite only caused minor harm.
Ms Azeera had argued that the bite only left the officer with a superficial wound, without any evidence of long-lasting damage
She said: “There was no premeditation. He had not intended to bite the officer, it was a rash act done in the chaos of the arrest to right the injustice he believed was being done to him.”
Ms Azeera said Amashiro had wanted to show the officers where the knife was but felt it was difficult as he was being restrained.
In a separate case, Mohammad Ridzuan Rohaizat was charged on Sept 17 after he sped away from traffic police officers at 106kmh on the KPE.
Ridzuan, 31, then crashed his car into a metal pole in Punggol Central, and fled on foot but was stopped by the officers.
While they were trying to detain him, he bit one of them on the left arm.
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