Phipps Jonathan acted for the Accused

UPDATE (December 2016): Accused granted probation on successful appeal to the High Court by Phipps Jonathan

SINGAPORE – A polytechnic student who came across nude photos of two models online threatened to trade photos of one of them after she refused to have sex with him.

Winfred Quek Xiu Zhi, 21, had claimed that he would help the victim, a 20-year-old freelance model, remove the photos from a forum website.

This was around August 2013, when Quek called the victim using a foreign number.

He also claimed to have her nude photographs.

The next day, he called the victim again, lying that he had paid $6,000 for her photographs to be removed from the website. He wanted compensation from her… Judge Lim rejected counsel Jonathan Phipps’ argument that it was a “spur of the moment” offence.

He said he had considered that Quek committed the offence as a youthful offender.

However, given the serious nature of the offence and the manner in which it was committed, probation was clearly inappropriate and a custodial sentence was necessary, he noted.

Quek is appealing. Bail of $15,000 has been offered.

The maximum punishment for the offence is two years’ jail and a fine.

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