Drugged, raped for 8 years - Singaporean's ordeal in hands of depraved ex-hubby

New Straits Times

6 hours ago

KUALA LUMPUR: The woman victimised in Singapore's "wife-rape" ring has recently recounted her life's darkest chapter to The Straits Times.
Annie (not her real name) was the first victim in a shocking trial that led to the conviction of seven men in the city-state, including her former husband.
Four of the men had plotted an elaborate and sadistic scheme, which involved drugging their own wives and allowing others to rape them.
Between 2010 and 2018, she endured a horrific ordeal: she was drugged and blindfolded by her then-husband, who invited various men to rape her while she was unconscious.
Now, her ex-husband and five other men involved in the "wife-rape ring" had been given lengthy prison sentences of between 13 and 22 years. Three of them were also given 20 strokes of the rotan.
To protect the victims' identities, a gag order had been issued by the court. The names of the seven men were anonymised in public records, a standard practice when sex offenders were close family members of their victims.
During the trial, they were identified only as "J", "K", "L", "M", "N", "O" and "P", and the victims were Annie, the wives of "K" and "L", as well as the ex-wife of "M".
Most of the accomplices were enlisted by Annie's former husband, known in media reports as "J". He frequently drugged Annie and arranged for five men to rape her, with one assault even occurring on their wedding anniversary.
Besides Annie, the man known as L also drugged his own wife and invited P to rape her, though that attempt was not successful when she regained consciousness. P was handed a three-year jail sentence in 2022.
In the exclusive interview, Annie said; "I really feel hatred. I really hate him for making me go through this, but there is nothing I can do about it. I just tell myself that I have to go on."
Annie's nightmare began in 2008. She was in her 20s and she met J at a karaoke pub. He was jovial, humorous and had charmed her with sweet talk.
Within months, she became pregnant and, despite her reservations, she married him.
"I told him, 'I don't feel secure with you. I have this thought that after marriage, you will have a lot of other women'," she recalled.
He, however, reassured her: "You are 'The One' for me. I have had enough fun, I will be a good husband and father to our children."
For years, Annie felt something was not right about J. He'd suggested installing a CCTV camera in their bedroom on the pretext of monitoring their children.
Police investigations later found that he had shared the camera's password online, allowing others to watch them in the bedroom at intimate moments.
Another time, while they were in bed, she caught him calling someone to listen in on their intimate moments.
Annie's life shattered on New Year's Day in 2020 when she found her husband asleep while watching a video on his phone.
A gut feeling led her to check his online chat history, and she was shocked to find explicit photos of him with a blindfolded woman, and horrifyingly, with herself also blindfolded and unconscious.
"I actually felt very blank. I could not imagine that he had done something like that to me."
Annie then forced her ex-husband to take her to the man whom he shared her explicit pictures with K.
She asked if he and K had raped her when she was unconscious, and after initial denials, he admitted it.
Fearing her children might become J's next victims, Annie filed a police report on Jan 2, 2020.
"I also thought what he did to me was really cruel. Really very cruel," she said as quoted.
The next day, she went to the police station. The following day, J and K were arrested.
As investigations progressed, Annie learnt that she had been violated by multiple men and not just K.
J had not only invited them into the couple's bedroom and watched as they raped her, but also snapped photos and later relived the assaults with them.
Annie had no recollection of the assaults, but the pieces began falling into place afterwards. She remembered J giving her pills for minor ailments, like a sore throat or cough.
"When I asked, 'How come I need to take so much medicine?', he would say, 'These are what you requested, and they are all good for you'," Annie recalled, noting she'd sometimes wake up groggy or without underwear.
It was later revealed J had been sedating her with dormicum pills, a prescription drug he bought from a peddler and even tested on himself.
"After I found out that he used this as a way to sedate me, I felt a very deep sense of betrayal," she said.
"I could not imagine somebody that I love so much doing this to me."
To cope with the emotional turmoil, she began drinking heavily. She also worked two jobs to keep her family afloat, all while shielding her children from the truth.
It took over a year before she could tell them what happened. When they finally heard, they burst into tears and hugged her. Her eldest child said of their father, "He can stay inside prison forever. I don't care."
Annie said; "I hated myself for being so blinded by love, by him and I also hated myself for being so forgiving.
"I felt very dirty. I felt very used. I just felt that there was no meaning for me to exist, actually. Why do I still exist?"
But each time those thoughts surfaced, she clung to one reason.
"I have to bring my children up. I cannot just leave them like that. It is not their fault," she said.
In the interview, Annie revealed that she attended the first few hearings in her ex-husband's trial, but stopped after that.
She testified against O, who was the only perpetrator to claim trial. O was eventually found guilty and sentenced to 13 years' jail and 12 strokes of the rotan.
J and the other four men had pleaded guilty, but Annie did not attend her ex-husband's sentencing. He received the heaviest penalty of 29 years' jail and 24 strokes of the rotan.
"I felt sad for him that he has to serve (a long sentence), but I also felt glad that all the accused are receiving the punishment they should be receiving," she said.
While Annie, whose divorce was finalised in April this year, no longer speaks to her former in-laws, however, she permitted her children to visit them as she valued family ties.
She had sold her marital home and moved into a smaller flat. Besides financial reasons, she also wanted to avoid her former neighbors' questions about J's whereabouts.