SINGAPORE: The six-page letter submitted as his mitigation is a window into the mind of a pervert, as The New Paper reported.
Yesterday, Jonathan Wong, 25, a former Ministry of Education scholar, was jailed five years for having sex with a teen he met at church.
In his letter, Wong wrote about the help he wants to receive.
The way he sees it, he spoke with a doctor about treatment on two fronts – self-control and arousal, and figured that self-control training was about countering temptations.
But he added: “Arousal training, on the other hand, seeks to redirect my interest and my responses away from underage girls to at the very least, adults.
“Specifically, though, he (my doctor) has approached and obtained my girlfriend’s permission to be the target of my ‘redirection’, a development that I very much look forward to because I want to be faithful to her and only her… I have wronged her.”
All that time while he was abusing his victim, then 15, Wong had a girlfriend who is still studying in a local university.
Now, he intends to rope her into his rehabilitation training.
Wong struggled to keep his perversion in control.
He wrote: “I wonder if there is medication that can medically reduce my sex drive.
“Although as I grow older the drive apparently decreases, I would like to make sure of that now, to ensure that I am safe to move around in society, by reducing any chance of arousal or losing control.”
In a psychiatric assessment, Dr Guo Song, a consultant psychiatrist from the Institute of Mental Health, said Wong exhibits signs of paedophilia.
Dr Guo also said in the Oct 27, 2011 report that Wong “should be kept away from any contact with an underage female”.
Last month, Wong pleaded guilty to sexually penetrating his victim, then 15, with his fingers, making his victim perform oral sex on him and vice versa, having sex with an underage girl, and asking his victim to perform an obscene act for him.
These offences took place between February and June last year.
Yesterday, Deputy Public Prosecutor Kavita Uthrapathy urged the court to mete out a deterrent sentence in light of the damage Wong had done to his victim and her family.
She added that the victim’s father told her that while Wong may be sentenced for a period of time, the family’s sentence is for life.
The girl’s father found out about what happened when her school called over concerns of her slipping grades.
The father also claimed that Wong told his daughter’s friends over Facebook before his arrest that he would look for the girl once he is released.
Wong replied in court: “It was not in the spirit of getting revenge. We were still friends. I wasn’t going to do anything to her.
“I don’t want to look for her to remind her of anything. I would want to keep my distance from her.
“Even if I happen to be in the area, looking for her can mean a lot of things; definitely not for any kind of payback.
“I couldn’t possibly do anything because the fault is all mine.”
In the same letter, Wong detailed his triggers.
He wrote: “I came to realise that my condition kicks in and my unholy desires and emotions come to the fore under two major circumstances – when stoked by pornography, or when triggered by an overly close emotional and physical contact with an underage girl.”
His first brush with the law was in the UK, where he was a Ministry of Education scholar studying history at the University of York.
In Dec 2010, Wong was caught for owning child pornography.
His six-month sentence was suspended for two years on the condition that he underwent eight months of supervision.
The judge also ordered that Wong be listed on the UK Sex Offenders Registry for seven years.
Wong lost his scholarship and returned to Singapore in January last year.
But once he was back, there was no known monitoring on him.
He found a job as an editorial assistant with a magazine, where he was faced with sexy models.
Wong said he attempted to curb his addiction and perverted ways by putting “web filters and nanny programmes whose passwords are set by my family and my girlfriend”.
He added in the letter: “Upon my release, I will seek ways to do the same to my smartphone, as it is also capable of Internet access.”
In this case, Wong met his victim offline. They were choir members in the same church.
He befriended her in February last year, lent her his listening ear, slowly gained her trust and started broaching the topic of sex with her over their Facebook and Skype conversations.
Wong baited her, starting with an agreement to take her along on a ghost-hunting expedition.
In exchange, he wanted to teach her about sex.
Wong also apologised to his victim and her family in his letter.
He wrote: “For (the victim), I feel such a terrible responsibility and such a need to let her know I am sorry – but I know deep inside that any contact at all will only serve to remind of the things past, and the best thing I can do is to stay away from her, to give her space to heal amidst friends and family.”
When he was 15 and studying in a secondary school here, Wong was caught and punished for peeping at primary school girls in the toilet.
He was caned and counselled, the school spokesman told The York Press in 2010.
The New Paper reported then that the police had not been notified of that act.
In his letter, Wong wrote: “These (web filters and nanny programmes) are precautions directed at preventing my paedophilia (how I hate that word) from being triggered, but on its own it will be insufficient.”
But a paedophile is what he is.