Man sent ex-girlfriend's nudes to religion-themed porn group as revenge, victim went undercover to expose him

VICTIM DISCOVERS OFFENCES

On May 22, 2021, the victim received an Instagram message from a stranger who identified her by name and sexually solicited her, believing she had posted her own nude photos online.

Realising someone had impersonated her, the victim asked the stranger where he had obtained her nude photos. He then sent her a link to the tudung group.

The victim suspected Abdul and felt deeply distressed for a few days, but gathered her courage and went incognito to undertake her own investigation.

She created an undercover account on the platform three days later and joined the tudung group. She was horrified to discover multiple posts of obscene images and videos of tudung-clad females, with her images among the posts.

The victim tracked down her posts to the account Abdul used. The account shared the posts with a few users and also shared videos and images posted by these users.

The victim realised that one of the accounts had non-obscene photos of female religious leaders and informed one of the religious leaders about it before lodging a police report.

Due to the victim’s efforts, attention was drawn to the tudung group, allowing authorities to investigate it and get the platform to shut it down.

On May 27, 2021, the police obtained data showing that there were 79,348 members in the tudung group.

When news broke about the group that day, Abdul panicked and deleted his account along with the intimate videos and photos he had retained of the victim in his cloud account.

He was arrested the next day. On Sep 20, 2023, he contacted the victim using an anonymous account on Telegram in an attempt to apologise to her. The victim blocked him.

IMPACT ON THE VICTIM

The court heard that the victim continued to be contacted by her acquaintances about the intimate videos and images circulating online, up to June 2025. She did not seek therapy or psychological support because of the cost.

She felt shocked and betrayed, along with anger, disgust, shame and self-blame. She wanted to end her life but was stopped in time by her sister. She still lives in fear that people will recognise her and that her intimate images continue to circulate.

Because of the offence, she became estranged from her mother, whom court documents described as religious. Her friendships were affected as friends and acquaintances continued to contact her after coming across her nude photos.

She has not been able to enter a romantic relationship for the past five years due to trust issues stemming from the offence.

She had previously considered being a religious teacher but decided against it, fearing the shame that would result if her nude photos were discovered by others in the profession.

Abdul pleaded guilty to one charge of intentionally distributing an intimate image without the victim’s consent, knowing it would humiliate her.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Chong Kee En sought 30 to 36 months’ jail, three strokes of the cane and S$5,000 in compensation, saying this was an egregious case of revenge porn.

He said the victim was a minor in the snippets, her face was clearly visible and Abdul had taken steps to make sure her identity could be linked to her nude photos.

Defence lawyer Mr Sean Marican sought 12 months’ jail with no caning and a compensation order of S$500.

He said his client’s culpability was not as severe as submitted by the prosecution. He said Abdul was driven by anger at the victim’s rejection and had committed the offence on impulse and “opportunistically” after she rejected his request for forgiveness.

Principal District Judge Toh Han Li said this was a classic case of revenge porn and found that the harm caused to the victim was at “the lower end of severe”.

He also noted the fair degree of planning, preparation and premeditation by Abdul.

“The accused was out to exact revenge on the victim and to harm and humiliate her by depicting her with her face and full name as a promiscuous person in religious garb in platforms dedicated to pornography with a large number of users,” said Judge Toh.

“This led to the victim’s images and videos going viral and the victim continued to be sexually solicited to this day and had friends contacting her asking her about her nudes which they had come across on the internet,” he said.

He added that Abdul had also spoken of the victim in demeaning terms with users on the platforms, repeatedly posted and reposted her images and videos over more than a month, tried to cover his tracks by deleting his accounts, and breached a station bail condition by contacting her.

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