SINGAPORE: Two teenagers accused of drinking from juice bottles before returning them to a supermarket shelf pleaded guilty to the act on Thursday (Jul 16).
The court heard that Quek Xuan Zhi, 17, had filmed co-accused Nigel Pang Yew Ming, 18, taking swigs from juice bottles at the supermarket at 2 Bukit Batok West Avenue 7 at 6.45pm on Feb 6 before returning them to the shelf.
AdvertisementAdvertisementQuek filmed the entire incident and posted it on social media platform Instagram with the caption “how to spread Wuhan virus” on an Instagram Story using his account, which had at least 1,360 followers at the time.
[h=3]READ: Teens charged after one filmed the other drinking from bottles, returning them to supermarket shelf[/h]In his mitigation plea, defence counsel Tan Hee Joek, who was representing Quek, argued that the video was initially uploaded onto a private Instagram account, and it was a friend who had circulated it and caused it to go viral.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Timotheus Koh responded that though his Instagram account was private, Quek knew it had a “substantial following” and there was a “high likelihood” the post would go viral.
AdvertisementAdvertisementHe said he had no objections to calling for probation suitability reports for both Pang and Quek.
Defence counsel Dhillon Surinder Singh, who was representing Pang, agreed with the position, saying that a probation is the “most appropriate sentence”.
On Thursday, both Quek and Pang pleaded guilty to one charge of public nuisance each.
Pang, who had earlier maintained that he did not consent to the caption "how to spread Wuhan virus", retracted the denial and agreed to the statement of facts read out, which said that he knew Quek would caption the video as such and post it on Instagram.
[h=3]READ: Teen in viral supermarket juice-drinking stunt wants to claim trial, lawyer says[/h]The district judge called for a report to assess if both are suitable for probation. Quek and Pang will return to court on Aug 27.
For committing an act of public nuisance, both Quek and Pang could be jailed for up to three months, fined up to S$2,000 or both.
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