Teen blogger Amos Yee had an appeal against his prior conviction and jail sentence dismissed by the High Court on Thursday (Oct 8).
Yee was expected to attend the hearing for his appeal to be heard, but did not show up. His lawyer, Mr Alfred Dodwell, who filed the notice of appeal on Jul 9, was present.
Justice Tay Yong Kwang decided to conduct the hearing without the 16-year-old, who has already finished serving his 4-week prison sentence. Following a hearing that lasted about two hours, the appeal was dismissed.
The teen was found guilty of two charges in May this year, after a two-day trial. Yee was convicted of one count of making offensive or wounding remarks against Christianity and one count of circulating obscene imagery.
Said Justice Tay: “Yee used offending words against the central figure of the Christian religion.”
The High Court judge added: “Yee’s attitude of complete disregard for others … is not commonly seen. He did not respect anyone.” Justice Tay noted that the blogger had “openly defied” court orders and made sure his “bravado” was made known.
The defence argued that Yee was exercising his constitutional right to freedom of speech and provoke “critical discussion”. Said Mr Dodwell: “Yes, Amos has been rude but were his actions a crime?”
In response, Justice Tay said: “This is not freedom of speech, this is a licence to humiliate others. It seems like Yee is throwing stones at his neighbour’s flat to force his neighbour to notice him.”
The judge also had sharp comments on the blogger’s manner of speech.
“Yee used coarse, hard-hitting words to arouse emotions … vulgar insults to deliberately provoke readers and draw them out,” he said, adding that the 16-year-old should “wean himself off his preference for crude, rude language (and engage in) real debate”, which can “flourish in an environment of goodwill, reasoning and civil language”.
CASE HISTORY
Apart from the two charges Yee was convicted of, a third charge regarding statements Yee made in a YouTube video about the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew had been withdrawn.
Yee uploaded the controversial video on Mar 27, just five days after Mr Lee’s passing, in which the teen likened Mr Lee to Jesus and criticised the founding Prime Minister.
He was arrested two days later, after several police reports were made against him, and charged in court on Mar 31. Yee was initially granted bail, set at S$20,000, with the condition that he would not post materials online while his case was before the courts.
He later flouted these conditions on Apr 14 by publishing a post asking the public for donations. His parents refused to post bail again, and Yee was instead bailed out by family counsellor Vincent Law.
However, Yee flouted his bail conditions a second time on Apr 29 following two blog posts that touched on the terms of his bail and accusing his father of being abusive, causing Mr Law to discharge himself as bailor.
Yee, on his way to the courthouse the next day, was struck by a 49 year old man who wanted to “teach him a lesson”. Neo Gim Huah was sentenced to three weeks’ jail.
After being remanded at the Institute of Mental Health for two weeks for psychiatric assessments, Dr Cai Yiming concluded that Yee does not suffer from any mental disorder.
After Yee’s sentencing on Jul 6, Mr Dodwell had said his client was “remorseful”, but added: “Let’s not run away with the idea that just because he’s remorseful and stuff, that is in relation to the social context. Whether this was a crime or not, still remains a question we want to determine in the High Court”.
Source: www.channelnewsasia.com
