An Indian international student who sexually assaulted four women while delivering food for Uber Eats on the Gold Coast has been spared jail.
Swapnil Singh, 25, who came to Australia to study a Master of Pharmacy at Griffith University while working to support his family in India, faced Southport Magistrates Court on June 9 where he pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual assault and four counts of stalking.
Singh spent one day in custody on remand after being arrested and charged over the groping spree, which took place over a period of two-and-a-half hours in Surfers Paradise beginning at 2am on June 15 last year and was largely caught on CCTV, the Gold Coast Bulletin reported.
The court heard Singh was working as a delivery driver on an e-scooter despite having drunk a “considerable amount” of vodka when he pulled up behind his first victim, grabbed her bottom, and rode off.
Two hours later Singh followed his second victim for about five minutes before groping her bottom, putting his hand up her skirt and touching her genitals over her underwear.
When she turned around to confront him he asked her: “What are you doing all alone baby?”
Singh fled, only to return a short time later to slap her on the bottom as he went past.
About 20 minutes after that he followed two more women, grabbed one on the bottom, rode away, and then came back to do the same to the other.
Prosecutors pushed for a custodial sentence for the “brazen… protracted and persistent” offending, but Singh’s lawyer said his client had no criminal history, had expressed remorse, was getting counselling, and was “clearly suffering from something” at the time of his crimes as they were bound to be detected.
Magistrate Lisa O’Neill sentenced Singh to 12 months’ imprisonment, but suspended the entire sentence for two years.
The court heard Singh was already facing deportation for failing to fulfil his visa conditions after being excluded from his studies for poor grades.
Header image: Swapnil Singh (Gold Coast Bulletin).
