Former Grab driver fined S$2,400 for posting photos of himself sniffing underwear from clothes racks

• Lim Wei Ming’s posts about obscene acts went viral shortly after he posted them
• He went to Chua Chu Kang and Tampines to perform the lewd acts
• 38 police reports were filed against him

SINGAPORE — When Lim Wei Ming came across a pair of shorts hanging on a clothes rack in Chua Chu Kang in 2018, he masturbated and took some photographs of the piece of clothing before returning it to the rack.

He then uploaded selfies of himself sniffing women’s undergarments on his Instagram account that later went viral.

The 35-year-old Singaporean was fined S$2,400 on Friday (Sept 18) after pleading guilty to one charge each of being a public nuisance and possessing obscene films. Another three similar charges were taken into consideration for sentencing.

After he was arrested in August last year, a psychiatrist from the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) found that he had fetishistic disorder with a specific predilection for female intimate wear. 

The psychiatrist also found that Lim is not intellectually disabled and was not of unsound mind at the time of his offences.

The court heard that Lim was working as a driver with ride-hailing firm Grab when he came across the pair of black shorts sometime in 2018.

He owned an Instagram account but made his first posts on Aug 14 last year.

He posted three photos of the shorts with the caption: “Public pcc onto black shorts. Then after that just hang back same place I took it. Will dry in the morning. This is 3 days worth of load.”

“Pcc” is an acronym for a Hokkien phrase that means “masturbate”.

He also posted two photos of a pink female undergarment and four photos of himself in Tampines sniffing and posing with it in his shirt pocket.

He deleted the posts when he received complaints from other Instagram users.

Thirty-eight police reports were filed against Lim on the police’s online I-Witness platform.

One person included a screenshot of his Instagram profile and wrote: “This guy like sexually harassing ppl (sic)… He got come and harass ppl (sic) around the area I study in.”

Lim was arrested two days later at his home. 

Police officers seized his mobile phone and found that it contained four obscene videos that he had downloaded.

Court documents showed that he sent the videos to someone named Sim Teck Koon through WhatsApp on Aug 6 last year. No further details were given.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Sean Teh sought a fine of S$5,000, saying the posts “led to a significant amount of public annoyance”.

In mitigation, Lim’s lawyer David Nayar said that his client is now jobless and getting “non-stop psychiatric treatment” at IMH.

The lawyer added: “The posts spread like wildfire but it wasn’t his intention for it to be seen in that manner.”

Even though his Instagram profile was public, people had to search for his username to see the posts, Mr Nayar noted.

In sentencing Lim, District Judge Tan Jen Tse took into account that he had been in remand for psychiatric observation for about a month before being released on bail.

For public nuisance, Lim could have been fined up to S$1,000.

For possessing obscene films, he could have been jailed up to a year or fined up to S$40,000, or both.