in 1994. It was in the papers, on tv news, probably written on public toilet walls, scribbled on messages hidden in fortune cookies, etc. Lot of people got fairly huffy about it.
Michael P. Fay
Michael Peter Fay (born May 30, 1975) is an American who briefly shot to worldwide fame when he was sentenced to caning in Singapore as an 18-year-old on May 5, 1994, for theft and vandalism. Caning is a routine court sentence in Singapore but most Americans were unfamiliar with it, and Fay's case was the first caning involving an American citizen.
The number of cane strokes in his sentence was reduced from six to four after US officials requested leniency.
~snip~
Response from the United States
The official position of the United States government was that while it recognized Singapore's right to try and punish Fay with due process of law, it deemed the punishment of caning to be excessive for a teenager committing a non-violent crime. The United States embassy in Singapore pointed out that the graffiti damage that Fay made on the cars was not permanent, but caning would leave Fay with physical as well as long-term emotional scars.
U.S. President Bill Clinton called the punishment prescribed by Singapore as extreme and mistaken, continuing to pressure the Singaporean government to grant Fay clemency from caning. Two dozen U.S. senators signed a letter to the Singaporean government also appealing for clemency. After Fay's punishment was carried out, the United States Trade Representative said that he would try to prevent the World Trade Organization's first ministerial meeting from taking place in Singapore. The Singaporean government was unintimidated by American pressure, pointing out that Singaporeans who break the law faced the same punishments as Fay, and that the United States should pay more attention to their domestic problems, such as American law and order, rather than telling other countries what to do.
Following Fay's sentence, the case received wide coverage by the U.S. and world media and dozens of reporters were sent to Singapore to cover the case.<1> The New York Times had several editorials and op-eds that condemned the punishment and called the American public to flood the Singaporean embassy in the United States with protests. Newsday wrote about a person who claimed to have witnessed a graphic public caning event in Singapore, despite the fact that Singapore has never carried out canings in public. Some commentaries treated the Michael Fay affair as a clash of civilizations between Asian values and the differing view of human rights common in liberal western cultures.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_P._Fay~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Caning in Singapore
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Caning is used widely as a legal form of corporal punishment in the island-state of Singapore. It can be subdivided into several contexts, namely domestic/private, school, reform school, military and judicial.
Of these, judicial caning, for which Singapore is best known, is the most severe. It is reserved for male criminals aged under 50, for at least 30 different offences under the Criminal Procedure Code. Caning is also a legal form of punishment for delinquent male members of the military (Singapore Armed Forces), and also in reform schools and as a form of prison disciplinary measure. In a somewhat milder form, caning is used to punish misbehaving male students in many Singaporean schools.
A much smaller cane is also used by some parents as a punishment for their children of either sex. This is not outlawed in Singapore.
More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore
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