Man upset that his ex has moved on, rapes her ‘for her own good’

A man was upset that his former girlfriend had moved on from their relationship in which he abused her, ambushed the 20-year-old woman at her home, and raped her in her bedroom.

Throughout the assault, he blamed her for his actions, prosecutors told the High Court on Jan 20.

As he repeatedly slapped her, he asked: “Why do you have to make me do this?”

Just before he sexually violated her, he told her that this was what she “asked for”.

After the assault, which he said was “for her own good”, he suggested that they should get back together.

The clean-cut 26-year-old man was sentenced to 10 years and six weeks’ jail, and nine strokes of the cane. He cannot be named under a gag order to protect the victim’s identity.

He had pleaded guilty to a charge of rape, a charge of voluntarily causing hurt and a charge of mischief for cutting his electronic ankle tag while he was on bail.

Two other charges, for sexual offences against the victim, were taken into consideration during sentencing.

Deputy public prosecutors Nicholas Khoo and Yeow Xuan had sought a sentence of nine years and three weeks’ jail to 10 years and six weeks’ jail, with at least nine strokes of the cane.

“To gift the accused’s own words back to him, such a sentence would be ‘for his own good’ as the time would allow him to properly reflect on the harm he has inflicted on a defenceless young girl,” they said in written submissions.

The man’s lawyers, Mr Josephus Tan and Mr Cory Wong, said their client’s words during the assault were akin to a live commentary of his highly turbulent emotional state at the time, and showed that there was no premeditation on his part.

They said their client wanted to disavow anything previously said which is remotely suggestive of victim-blaming.

The man and the woman had met through an online dating app, and began a relationship from July 2020.

He would sometimes turn violent by hitting the victim or strangling her when he felt that she had done something wrong.

The woman ended their relationship in May 2021, but he continued to contact her, even after she told him that she was dating someone else.

On Aug 21, 2021, the woman told the man that they could still be friends, but that he should no longer message her. She then blocked him on her social media accounts.

Upset that the woman had stopped responding to him, the man went to confront her at her home.

The woman, who not been on good terms with her family in the months before the incident, lived with two maternal aunts and her maternal grandparents.

The man arrived at the unit near midnight, and was let in as the woman’s aunts were unaware that she had broken up with him.

He headed straight to the victim’s bedroom, closed the door, and went on a tirade, demanding to know why she had blocked him.

The victim tried to text her boyfriend, but the man snatched her phone away from her.

When she tried to leave, he stopped her and locked the door.

Angered that she did not respond to his questioning, he pushed her down on her bed, straddled her, and slapped her multiple times with both his hands.

She clawed at him and tried to push his hands away, but he raped her.

After the rape, the victim made up an excuse to leave the unit, and this time, the man did not stop her.

The victim was initially not keen to report the rape to the police.

However, on Oct 15 that year, the man again showed up unannounced at her home, and lied to her aunt that he was collecting some things for her.

However, the aunt was suspicious and stopped him taking anything with him.

As a result, the victim made a police report.

DPP Yeow told the court that the victim was unable to speak or verbalise her emotions for over a year after the rape, and would also be paralysed with fear in public whenever she saw someone who resembled the man.

The prosecutor said the victim’s family members are unaware of the sexual assault; she is fearful of being judged for allowing the rape to happen to her and that she would be thrown out of her home by her aunts.

On April 24, 2023, the police received a notification that the man’s electronic tag had been tampered with.

He initially told police officers that the tag had inadvertently been damaged in a rock-climbing accident.

On further questioning, he admitted that he loosened the tag with a pair of pliers so that he can spend more time with his friends beyond his designated curfew hours.