Police report made about man who wanted to ‘open fire’ on LGBT community

SINGAPORE – Several police reports have been lodged over a Facebook user who declared he wanted to “open fire”  on the  lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT), in a Facebook comment made earlier this month.

The user, Bryan Lim, had on June 4 – the day of the annual Pink Dot event supporting the LGBT cause – posted a comment on a Facebook page called We are against Pinkdot in Singapore, saying: “I am a Singaporean citizen. I am a NSman. I am a father. And I swore to protect my nation.  Give me the permission to open fire. I would like to see these £@€$^*s die for their causes.”

Mr Lim’s comment was in response to a Facebook post on the page expressing disapproval against multi-national corporations supporting the Pink Dot movement.

Another Facebook user had flagged Mr Lim’s comment on the Singapore Police Force Facebook page, prompting the police to state: “Police confirm that a report has been lodged and investigations are ongoing.”

Student, Joshua Tan, was one of the those who had made a police report. Mr Tan, 24, told TODAY that Mr Lim’s comments appeared dangerous, and he decided to report to draw public attention to it. He added that Mr Lim had to be brought in for questioning by the police, to assess whether he poses a threat to the LGBT community in Singapore. “After all it’s a form of intimidation and inciting of violence itself,” he added.

Netizens also expressed outrage over Mr Lim’s comments, with some looking up personal information linked to him and sharing it online, such as his employment status, his LinkedIn profile and a photo of him in what appeared to be police uniform. TODAY understands that Mr Lim is not a national serviceman for the Singapore Police Force.

After screenshots from LinkedIn showed that Mr Lim appeared to employed by Canon Singapore as a performance consultant, Canon Singapore published a statement on their Facebook page saying : “We take this issue seriously and are looking into this matter”.

“At Canon Singapore, we live by our philosophy of Kyosei – which we define as "all people, regardless of race, religion, or culture, harmoniously living and working together for the common good." As such, we do not condone violence in any form,” the company added.