S'porean Amos Yee violated terms of release from US jail, parole delayed till November
A search on the Illinois Department of Corrections website showed that the 26-year-old's projected parole date is set for Nov 7, exactly two years after his re-arrest.
The Singaporean's projected discharge date, meanwhile, is now set at three years to life, with the length to be determined. He was originally set to be released on April 24.
Under Illinois state law, an individual's projected discharge date indicates when they will be let off parole, which is also known as mandatory supervised release.
'Amos Yee is not eligible to resume mandatory supervised release until Nov 7, 2025, due to the Prisoner Review Board determining he violated the terms of his release,' a spokeswoman for the Illinois Department of Corrections said, without providing additional information.
Yee fled to the US in December 2016, a day before he was supposed to report for a medical examination ahead of his enlistment into national service.
He was granted political asylum in the US in 2017 after citing persecution for his political opinions. The former teenage blogger was jailed twice in Singapore over separate incidents.
While in the US, he again ran afoul of the law.
In February 2019, he repeatedly asked a 14-year-old girl living in Texas to send him nude photos of herself, which he reciprocated with nude photos of his own.
In message exchanges that numbered in the thousands, he engaged in role-play and sexual fantasies with the girl, even though she mentioned her age multiple times in WhatsApp correspondences with Yee.
He was arrested in October 2020 and sentenced to six years' jail at Illinois River Correctional Centre, a medium-security state prison, over grooming a teenage girl and possessing child pornography.
The Singaporean was initially released on parole on Oct 7, 2023, three years ahead of his original release date in 2026. However, just a month later, he was sent back to prison for undisclosed reasons.
Currently, he is housed in Danville Correctional Centre, a medium-security adult male prison located about a 2h 40min drive away from Chicago.
He has been listed on the sex offender registry in the US because of his offences, and his name, crime and home address are available to the public online.
Source: The Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction
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