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Saturday, 30 May 2009
Couple found guilty of sending out seditious tracts
A christian couple who mass-mailed evangelical tracts to the public for many years were yesterday found guilty of distributing seditious or objectionable publications to three Muslims.
Couple found guilty of sending out seditious tracts
Elena Chong 29 May 2009
A christian couple who mass-mailed evangelical tracts to the public for many years were yesterday found guilty of distributing seditious or objectionable publications to three Muslims.
Ong Kian Cheong, 50, a SingTel technical officer, and his wife, Dorothy Chan Hien Leng, 46, a UBS associate director, were also convicted of having 439 copies of 11 seditious publications at their Maplewoods Condominium on Jan 30 last year.
This is the first time a full trial under the Sedition Act has been heard.
In 2005, a man was jailed a month for posting inflammatory and vicious remarks about Muslims and Malays on the Internet.
The following year, a 21-year-old accounts assistant received a stern warning for posting an offensive cartoon of Jesus Christ on his blog.
Ong was arrested on Jan 30 last year after he was seen by police dropping off a stack of brown envelopes into a post box outside his office at ComCentre at Exeter Road.
He subsequently led the officers to his car and his home, where more of the Chick Publications materials were seized. Chan was arrested the same day.
The case centred on whether the couple, who were then attending Berean Christian Church at Havelock Road, knew or had reason to believe that the publications they had mailed to the three were seditious.
The prosecution argued that the couple had carried out their evangelical mission ‘with eyes wide open’, and that they were fully aware of the offensive nature of the contents.
They distributed those offensive publications to members of different faiths in Singapore with no regard for their feelings or sensitivities, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Anandan Bala in his closing submissions.
In their defence, the couple claimed they had not read nor known what the 11 publications contained.
Neither did they have reason to believe that the 11 tracts, with titles such as The Little Bride, Who Is Allah?, Are Roman Catholics Christians? and Man In Black, were seditious since they were openly sold at the Tecman book store in Bras Basah Complex.
The Media Development Authority’s senior assistant director (publications) A. R. Madeei testified that the tracts by the US evangelical publisher denigrated Islam and the Catholic Church.
They were also likely to cause feelings of enmity, hatred, ill-will and hostility between different racial or religious groups.
District Judge Roy Neighbour rejected the couple’s defence that they did not know or suspect that the publications were seditious or objectionable.
‘I do not believe that both the accused persons did not read or know the contents of the tracts they distributed to the public. Both the accused are educated and intelligent people,’ he said.
The judge said he did not believe that Ong was merely the ‘postman’.
‘Clearly both accused were actively engaged in ‘tracting’,’ he said, noting that denying knowledge was ‘an all too convenient excuse when one is confronted with incriminating evidence’.
‘I do not believe that in their fervour to spread the gospel truth they did not read the publications,’ the judge said.
The case was adjourned until Thursday for mitigation and possible sentencing.
1 comment:
Couple found guilty of sending out seditious tracts
Elena Chong
29 May 2009
A christian couple who mass-mailed evangelical tracts to the public for many years were yesterday found guilty of distributing seditious or objectionable publications to three Muslims.
Ong Kian Cheong, 50, a SingTel technical officer, and his wife, Dorothy Chan Hien Leng, 46, a UBS associate director, were also convicted of having 439 copies of 11 seditious publications at their Maplewoods Condominium on Jan 30 last year.
This is the first time a full trial under the Sedition Act has been heard.
In 2005, a man was jailed a month for posting inflammatory and vicious remarks about Muslims and Malays on the Internet.
The following year, a 21-year-old accounts assistant received a stern warning for posting an offensive cartoon of Jesus Christ on his blog.
Ong was arrested on Jan 30 last year after he was seen by police dropping off a stack of brown envelopes into a post box outside his office at ComCentre at Exeter Road.
He subsequently led the officers to his car and his home, where more of the Chick Publications materials were seized. Chan was arrested the same day.
The case centred on whether the couple, who were then attending Berean Christian Church at Havelock Road, knew or had reason to believe that the publications they had mailed to the three were seditious.
The prosecution argued that the couple had carried out their evangelical mission ‘with eyes wide open’, and that they were fully aware of the offensive nature of the contents.
They distributed those offensive publications to members of different faiths in Singapore with no regard for their feelings or sensitivities, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Anandan Bala in his closing submissions.
In their defence, the couple claimed they had not read nor known what the 11 publications contained.
Neither did they have reason to believe that the 11 tracts, with titles such as The Little Bride, Who Is Allah?, Are Roman Catholics Christians? and Man In Black, were seditious since they were openly sold at the Tecman book store in Bras Basah Complex.
The Media Development Authority’s senior assistant director (publications) A. R. Madeei testified that the tracts by the US evangelical publisher denigrated Islam and the Catholic Church.
They were also likely to cause feelings of enmity, hatred, ill-will and hostility between different racial or religious groups.
District Judge Roy Neighbour rejected the couple’s defence that they did not know or suspect that the publications were seditious or objectionable.
‘I do not believe that both the accused persons did not read or know the contents of the tracts they distributed to the public. Both the accused are educated and intelligent people,’ he said.
The judge said he did not believe that Ong was merely the ‘postman’.
‘Clearly both accused were actively engaged in ‘tracting’,’ he said, noting that denying knowledge was ‘an all too convenient excuse when one is confronted with incriminating evidence’.
‘I do not believe that in their fervour to spread the gospel truth they did not read the publications,’ the judge said.
The case was adjourned until Thursday for mitigation and possible sentencing.
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