SINGAPORE: A man labelled by the prosecution as a “one-man distribution hub” for child sexual abuse content was sentenced on Monday (Jul 14) to jail for three years and one month, along with four strokes of the cane.
Danial Abdul Rahman, 31, pleaded guilty to a charge of possessing 285 videos depicting child sexual abuse for the purpose of distribution, with a second charge considered in sentencing.
Most of the videos showed children engaging in or appearing to engage in sexual activity. Seven of them depicted a victim of torture, cruelty or physical abuse.
In the videos, a total of 414 children were featured, of which 383 were identifiable.
The longest clip was more than an hour and 50 minutes.
The court heard that Danial was training to be a digital marketer at the time of the offence.
In 2017, he began browsing blogging website Tumblr in search of obscene materials involving males. He would then download the content and store it in a Google Drive account.
He also used a browser to access the dark web for child abuse content, which he downloaded.
Danial joined various channels on chat application Telegram where obscene materials, including those of child abuse, was being shared and distributed. He would download the content and store it on his Google Drive account.
In 2018, Danial created an account on Twitter, now known as X. He used the account to post obscene content or to retweet materials from other similar accounts.
Followers of his account grew to about 200 to 500. Some users sent him messages privately asking for help to download certain obscene materials, including those of child abuse, on their behalf.
Danial agreed, using the dark web to look for the child abuse content and sending it to the user via direct message or sharing a link to his Google Drive account.
In May 2021, Danial’s Twitter account was suspended. He began receiving requests for child abuse material from users via Telegram and he would agree to them.
He distributed such materials to multiple users, including at least five users on Twitter, for at least four years from 2018 to March 2022.
The police received information on Danial’s activities and raided his home on May 12, 2022.
He admitted that he had uploaded obscene content onto his Google Drive account and was arrested.
The police seized his devices and found the 285 videos containing child abuse content.
Court documents recorded disturbing details about the videos, such as infants below a year old included in the videos and having degrading acts performed on them.
The prosecution sought 37 to 39 months’ jail for Danial, along with six strokes of the cane, calling his conduct “reprehensible in the highest degree”.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Benjamin Low said: “By acceding to, and wilfully complying with, the depraved requests by other third-party internet users for child sexual abuse material to fuel their own perverted predilections, the accused actively and persistently contributed to the market for child sexual abuse material by acting as a one-man distribution hub in downloading child sexual abuse material.”
For possessing such material for distribution, Danial could have been jailed for up to seven years and fined or caned.
