Having evaded the mandatory National Service (NS) call up for over six years, Brian Joseph Chow had no choice but to serve time in jail when he returned to Singapore after completing his studies in Australia.
What’s special for the 25-year-old’s case is that he got a significantly reduced jail sentence of one-and-a-half months for his outstanding performance during his time in NS, according to the judge.
TODAY reports that Chow had gone to Australia in 2005 when he was 15 to study at Perth’s Murdoch College which that catered to his mental condition — attention deficit disorder. He was called up for NS three years later, and was unsuccessful in getting a deferment to pursue his studies in university.
Despite that, he carried on studying in the University of Western Australia, graduating in 2013. Chow returned to Singapore and completed his NS last year, and is undergoing a cadet pilot programme at ST Aerospace Academy.
For now however, he’ll have to complete his jail sentence first before moving on with his career. His initial sentence was a $4,500 fine, but the prosecution appealed against its inadequacy — and now he has to serve time in prison instead. If it wasn’t for Chow’s “outstanding performance” in NS, he would have gotten three months in jail.
