Man jailed for lying about address in daughter’s school enrolment
SINGAPORE — Wanting to enrol his daughter in a prestigious school, a self-employed man lied about where he lived — and ended up being sentenced to two weeks’ jail.
A man in handcuffs. Photo: Reuters
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SINGAPORE — Wanting to enrol his daughter in a prestigious school, a self-employed man lied about where he lived — and ended up being sentenced to two weeks in jail.
The 35-year-old man, whose name has been withheld to protect his daughter’s identity, is appealing against the sentence, which was imposed by district judge Shaiffudin Saruwan today (March 3).
The man had pleaded guilty last month to giving false information to the school’s principal on July 30, 2013.
In the application forms to enrol his daughter, the man had indicated that he lived within a radius of 1km to 2km of the school — knowing that applicants residing in that zone are given priority under Phase 2C of the Primary One registration exercise, should the number of applications exceed the number of vacancies.
He had also produced his identity card with the new address as part of the application.
The address the man had stated in the application forms was that of a property leased to an American national, who was renting the unit until April next year.
The court heard that in September 2013, the man reverted the residential address on his identity card to that of his actual home at Balestier Road, which was outside the school’s stated radius.
The false information had, however, secured his daughter a place at the desired school and she was reportedly still enrolled there when he was charged on May 27 last year.
The matter was brought to light in December 2013, when the Ministry of Education conducted a house visit to the address stated in the man’s application forms and discovered that the property was occupied by the American and his wife.
In his mitigation for the court to impose only a fine, defence lawyer Ramesh Tiwary said the man was a law-abiding citizen with a clean record. His client had genuinely intended to move into the address stated in the application, but was unable to do so because he could not contact the tenant, Mr Tiwary added.
For providing false information to a public servant, the man could have been jailed up to a year and/or fined S$5,000.
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