Covid-19: Woman charged with climbing up to another hotel room balcony while on stay-home notice

SINGAPORE — A 39-year-old woman was charged on Friday (July 30) with breaking Covid-19 laws by twice leaving her Sentosa hotel room without a face mask while on a stay-home order.

Jin Chensu is accused of climbing up to the balcony of another room and staying there for about five minutes, before climbing down to the balcony of her room, the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) said in a statement.

The Singaporean now faces two charges each of exposing others to the risk of coronavirus infection as well as failing to wear a mask in public.

Jin returned from Cambodia on Oct 4 last year and was served a stay-home notice till Oct 18.

An ICA officer told her that she had to serve it at a dedicated facility and was not allowed to leave her room at the Shangri-la Rasa Sentosa.

Two days later, she allegedly left her room without wearing a mask and climbed up to the balcony of another room at about 7pm. Court documents did not state why she did this.

She purportedly left her room again three days later, again without a mask on, then loitered along the common corridor. 

ICA said that hotel employees found her about 25 minutes later and escorted her back to her room.

A bespectacled Jin appeared in court via a video-link on Friday.

When a police prosecutor applied for her to be remanded in the Institute of Mental Health for psychiatric evaluation, she said to District Judge Lorraine Ho that she had been ready to accept a composition fine when she surrendered to the investigation officer “about 20 hours ago”.

She added that she was surprised the fine had allegedly been taken off the table and that she did not get a reply from the investigation officer about this. 

She then asked the prosecution to “reinstate the composition”.

Those who are offered composition fines will not be charged for the same offence.

However, the judge ordered for her to be remanded in IMH first.

Jin will return to court on Aug 13.

Those convicted of breaching Covid-19 regulations can be jailed for up to six months or fined up to S$10,000, or both.

Members of the public may report information about anyone who fails to comply with stay-home notice requirements to ICA at go.gov.sg/reportshnbreach or call 6812 5555.