SINGAPORE – A secondary school teacher who got to know one of his male students in 2020 started sending the boy sexually explicit text messages two years later.

Feeling sexually exploited, the 15-year-old victim alerted the police in February 2023.

The 64-year-old man, who cannot be named owing to a gag order to protect the victim’s identity, was sentenced to three weeks’ jail on Thursday after he pleaded guilty to one count of having sexual communication with a minor below 16 years old.

He got to know the boy in 2020 when the latter was a Secondary 1 student, and they shared a teacher-student relationship.

The man started texting the boy in late 2022 and, in November that year, sent the teenager a message about a sex toy and how it could be used.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Lee Da Zhuan told the court: “The victim was alarmed by the accused’s messages and felt sexually exploited.”

Shortly after midnight on Jan 28, 2023, the man sent another sexually explicit text message to the boy, who alerted the police 10 days later.

On Thursday, DPP Lee asked for the man to be sentenced to at least a month in jail, adding: “Instead of caring for the victim as a student, the accused made use of his position as a teacher to procure sexual conversations with the student.

“The accused acted exactly the opposite of his responsibility towards the victim as his teacher by taking advantage of the victim, sexually texting the victim on multiple occasions.”

In a statement to The Straits Times on Friday, the Ministry of Education (MOE) said that the man has not been teaching in any school since February 2023 when the case was reported to it.

Its spokesperson added: “MOE takes a serious view of staff misconduct and will take disciplinary action against those who fail to adhere to our standards of conduct and discipline, including dismissal from service.”