UPDATE [6.54am, Monday, 6 July]: The Online Citizen understands that Amos Yee is now back at the Institute of Mental Health, after being sent to the A&E department of Changi Hospital on Sunday night.
Even as activists gathered at Hong Lim Park to call for her son’s release, the mother of teenager Amos Yee was being informed by the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) that her son would be sent to a hospital on Sunday night.
Mdm Mary Toh, Amos’s mother, says she has been informed by IMH staff that her son is now in hospital.
16-year old Amos Yee had been remanded at the IMH the last two weeks for psychiatric assessment.
He is reported to be held at block 7 in the institution, believed to be the remand ward where mentally ill patients and the criminally insane are also held.
Mdm Mary Toh tells TOC on Sunday that her son’s blood glucose level has dropped and that he has also been feeling giddy.
Mdm Toh had earlier said her son had not been eating for several days, was also not sleeping well and was feeling depressed. She says he has lost weight too.
“Even this morning, he was asking me why he can’t be released,” Mdm Toh says.
“Amos pleaded [with me] to get him out soon,” Mdm Toh told TOC on Wednesday. “He can’t stand even another day in there. He said prison is better than IMH.”
“IMH staff thought Amos could be discharged today,” Mdm Toh said then, adding that the staff have been very helpful but are also concerned about the teenager who she said has not eaten for three days.
“They are all very concerned and worried, but say they can’t do anything,” Mdm Toh said, referring to the IMH staff.
On Friday, the teen’s lawyers filed an urgent appeal with the court to ask for Amos Yee to be released on bail.
However, this was unsuccessful as the court had a full day’s schedule and was not able to accommodate an urgent hearing.
Amos Yee is scheduled to appear in court on Monday, 6 July, for his sentencing.
He was found guilty on 12 May of “wounding the religious feelings of Christians” in a video he posted online, and for posting an obscene image on his blog.
In the weeks since then, however, his treatment by the State has attracted international criticisms, including from the United Nations and Amnesty International which have described Amos Yee as a prisoner of conscience.
Protests in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia have also taken place this past week calling for his release.
On Sunday, some 500 people gathered at Singapore’s only venue for free speech to add their voices to the call.
500 people gathered at Hong Lim Park on Sunday to call for Amos Yee’s release (Photo: Terry Xu, TOC)
By the time of his next appearance in court on Monday, the teenager would have served a total of 55 days in remand at Changi Prison and the IMH.
On Monday, this could be extended further by a jail term or at least 18 months in a reformative training centre.
“According to the Office of the UN Commissioner on Human Rights,”Amnesty International said, “reformative training is ‘akin to detention and usually applied to juvenile offenders involved in serious crimes’ and was referred to in a recent Singapore district court decision as ‘incarcerative in nature and should be imposed cautiously’.”
The United Nations Human Rights Office for South-East Asia (OHCHR) said in a statementon 22 June.
“OHCHR is concerned that the criminal sanctions considered in this case seem disproportionate and inappropriate in terms of the international protections for freedom of expression and opinion.”
Hi, I would like to raise an awareness. I was using Woodlands Checkpoint few days back. When I was the Car’s queue at the Immigration counter, I saw the Immigration Officers PC serving the opposite of my counter.
In their PC Monitor, Left Side states HOT LIST and all wanted person picture will be moving upwards. Then I saw Amos Yee(in Yellow T-shirt) picture in it.
It was a shock of my life. A young teenage boy picture in the Hot List while he is IMH. How can pass thru Immigration while under custody. And lastly just for speaking the truth and what a normal born Singaporean feel in his heart got him in to Politically Intimidated/Bullied. I am now really terrified of the Ruling Party/Government/PAP/LHL. I am shocked that nobody reported it.
Teenage blogger Amos Yee Pang Sang, 16, has been remanded at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) for two weeks pending a psychiatric report.
Before the State Courts on Tuesday (Jun 23), District Judge Jasvender Kaur said that a report by Dr Munidasa Winslow said that Yee may suffer from autism-spectrum disorder. This emerged from the reformative training suitability report, which found the accused physically and mentally suitable for reformative training.
As such, Judge Kaur said that she is exploring other sentencing options, including a mandatory treatment order.
A mandatory treatment order provides treatment for offenders suffering from psychiatric conditions that are susceptible to treatment, where the accused will have to undergo psychiatric treatment. It is meted out in lieu of imprisonment.
It was introduced as part of a series of community-based sentencing (CBS) options implemented since January 2011, under Criminal Procedure Code 2010. If the CBS is successfully completed, the criminal record will be rendered spent. This means the offender is deemed to have no record of that conviction.
The next hearing is on Jul 6 at 2.30pm, when the psychiatric report is expected to be ready.
The prosecution, led by Deputy Public Prosecutor Hay Hung Chun, reminded the courts that they had suggested on two previous occasions that Yee be assessed by relevant experts on his mental health.
NO PREVIOUS INDICATION OF MENTAL CONDITION
Speaking to the media, Yee’s father Alphonsus said that he noted there was speculation from the public on Yee’s mental health but no previous medical check-ups had revealed that Yee might have autism-spectrum disorder.
Yee was found guilty of two charges – one for making offensive or wounding remarks against Christianity and another for circulating obscene imagery. A third charge, for the teen blogger’s statements on the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew in a YouTube video, was withdrawn.
On Tuesday, Yee agreed to privatise all his posts and not repost the offending posts, according to his lawyer Alfred Dodwell.
In his previous hearing on Jun 2, Judge Kaur made the call for the reformative training suitability report to be done in view of Yee refusing a possible probation sentence and failing to turn up for meetings with his probation officer.
After Yee’s probation officer reported the turn of events to the courts, prosecutors then made a call for reformative training, which was seen by them as a move that was in line with rehabilitation as opposed to a jail term or fine.
Reformative training is an option for young offenders aged between 16 and 18 years old who are assessed to be unsuitable for probation. Offenders will be detained for a minimum of 18 months in the Reformative Training Centre.
It was made known to prosecutors on May 21 that Yee had republished online the image and video pertaining to the case. He was told to take the materials down when he was charged.
In a statement Monday, the United Nations Human Rights Office asked Singapore courts to “drop the demand for sentencing (Yee) to the RTC” and called for the “immediate release of (Yee) in line with (Singapore’s) commitment under the UN Convention on the Rights of Child”.
When she was warded at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH), she abused two employees there. She was then put in a welfare home, where she damaged a room and tried to commit suicide.
Then, while being assessed at IMH to see if she was suitable for a mandatory treatment order, Joanne Lim Wan Ting punched a nurse.
Yesterday, the 23-year-old was sentenced to five months’ jail for a string of misdemeanours, including two counts of voluntarily causing hurt and one count of wilfully destroying the property of a welfare home.
Lim has borderline personality disorder, where one has difficulty regulating their emotions, but is understood to have been of sound mind during the offences.
Last November, Lim punched and pulled the hair of IMH nurse Thein Thein Moe, 44, when the latter was trying to stop her from banging her head on a glass counter because she was angry the nurse could not immediately attend to her.
In March, while living at the Angsana Home @ Pelangi Village in Buangkok Green, she was taken to a padded cell for safety reasons after shouting and throwing her food on the floor. Lim tore fabric off the wall lining and tried to strangle herself with it.
On April 13, Lim punched the head of IMH senior staff nurse Lim Theng Theng, 61, multiple times because she was unhappy staying at IMH and the nurse would sometimes scold her for not behaving herself.
At the time, Lim was being assessed for suitability for a mandatory treatment order.
In court yesterday, Lim told State Courts judge May Mesenas that she was sorry and was unsure where she would be living after her release from prison. She also agreed to cooperate if she were to be admitted to a welfare home again.
Asked about its standard procedures when staff members are assaulted at work, an IMH spokesperson said employees may lodge a police report.
“The management of IMH will not tolerate any form of abuse on our staff, be it verbal or physical,” she said. “However, sometimes, patients who hit our staff may be very unwell and have no insight into their actions. In such cases, our staff would usually choose not to make a police report.”
The accused, who cannot be named due to a gag order, pleaded guilty last month to having oral sex with the victim outside a toilet cubicle at the children’s home in June last year. Both were then staying at the home.
A district court heard that the victim was about to take off his clothes and put them in the laundry basket outside a toilet cubicle when the accused entered the toilet.
The accused asked the victim if he was all right and the boy replied in the affirmative. The accused came nearer to the victim and asked him to perform oral sex on him.
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SEORANG lelaki berusia 20 tahun dijatuhi hukuman menjalani latihan pemulihan padi tadi kerana membuat seorang budak lelaki berusia 12 tahun melakukan seks oral ke atasnya.
Kededua tertuduh dan mangsa merupakan penghuni sebuah rumah tumpangan kanak-kanak di sini, dan kesalahan itu berlaku di rumah tumpangan itu Jun tahun lalu.
Tertuduh, yang mengaku bersalah bulan lalu, telah mengadakan seks oral dengan mangsa di luar sebuah kubikel tandas.
Superintenden rumah tumpangan tersebut membuat laporan polis pada 19 Julai tahun lalu selepas mangsa mengadu kepadanya tentang kejadian itu.
Timbalan Pendakwa Raya, Cik Siti Adrianni Marhain, berkata tertuduh telah mengambil kesempatan ke atas mangsa yang muda, yang tujuh tahun lebih muda daripadanya.
Mangsa juga belum cukup matang untuk melakukan kegiatan seks, apatah lagi kejadian itu berlaku di sebuah rumah tumpangan kanak-kanak, di mana mangsa seharusnya berhak berasa selamat, kata Cik Adrianni.
Menurutnya, laporan Institut Kesihatan Mental (IMH) menunjukkan mangsa telah melahirkan rasa bersalah dan malu akibat kejadian itu.
Dalam rayuannya untuk meminta hukuman diringankan, tertuduh berkata dia tidak mendapat kasih sayang daripada ibu bapa.
Dia ditinggalkan ibunya semasa kecil lagi sementara bapanya telah meninggal dunia.
