SINGAPORE — A full-time national serviceman (NSF) with a history of peeping at girls in toilets went back to his old ways last year, this time by trying to look through a 20-year-old woman’s bedroom window in Chua Chu Kang.

Muhammad Nur Shafiq Omar had just completed his Hari Raya Puasa visits when he decided to peep at girls in a block of flats close to his own.

Shafiq, 24, was sentenced to six weeks and 20 days behind bars on Wednesday (Jan 15). He pleaded guilty to one charge of house trespass. Another charge of insulting his victim’s modesty taken into consideration for sentencing.

He committed his latest offence on June 27 last year, the court heard. He was serving his National Service with the Singapore Civil Defence Force then.

After his friend gave him a lift home at about 4am, he went to a nearby block of flats instead and noticed that the bedroom lights in one of the units were still switched on.

Walking around the corridor, he realised the sliding window of the bedroom was not locked. He pushed it open and reached in to push the curtains aside.

The victim, who cannot be named due to a court order to protect her identity, heard the sound of the window sliding open and screamed when she saw Shafiq's hand. He then fled towards the lift lobby.

By committing this offence, he had breached a remission order after being released from a previous stint in prison. He had been sentenced last year to 15 months’ jail and given one stroke of the cane for lurking house-trespass (or housebreaking).

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Tay Jia En told the court that Shafiq first broke the law in 2014, when he was given 15 months of probation for peeping at girls in women’s toilets.

He was then sent to a reformative training centre in 2015 for housebreaking.

DPP Tay pointed out that Shafiq had not learnt from his past probation or reformative training stints, where he “had the benefit of targeted intervention programmes to address his risk of sexual reoffending as well as his pro-criminal attitudes”.

In mitigation, Shafiq’s lawyer Caryn Lee said that he was “young, naive and immature” when he committed his past offences, and grew up in a family without adequate supervision.

“He’s matured and definitely has the propensity to reform… his family has been struggling to pay off their household expenses and he has chosen to chip in. His parents have taken an active role in supervising him now,” she added.

Shafiq is also willing to go for counselling and intends to continue his education once his family “is in a more comfortable position”, the lawyer said.

District Judge Toh Han Li imposed six weeks’ jail for his latest offence and an extra 20 days’ jail for the breach of the remission order.

For house trespass, he could have been jailed up to a year, fined up to S$3,000 or both.