By Khushwant Singh

SUSPECTING that his wife and stepdaughter had installed spy cameras in the flat, hawker Tam Yong Onn decided to give them something to film by raping his 20-year-old stepdaughter.

The 43-year-old hawker was jailed for 21 years with 21 strokes of the cane on Monday after he pleaded guilty to molesting and raping the young woman, and taking amphetamine.

The High Court on Monday was told that the man was suffering from paranoid delusions caused by smoking Ice.

Tam had met his wife in 2002. She and her daughter from her first marriage then moved into his flat and he married her in July 2006. She later gave birth to another daughter.

On June 27 last year, he was at home with his stepdaughter while his wife was manning their food stall.

The stepdaughter told police that at about 3pm, she saw Tam examining the television and air conditioning unit in the master bedroom. He then went out with something in a red plastic bag.

When he returned, he started cutting another plastic bag into ribbons.

Tam then confronted her and showed her the back of a wall-mounted clock. He insisted that a round object - the size of 10 cent coin - was a spy camera.

He insisted on checking her cellphone as he claimed that she was recording him. When he returned the phone, she called her mother to say that her stepfather was acting strangely again.

Moments later, Tam dragged her into the master bedroom, and tied her hands and ankles with plastic strips.

He ignored her assertions that there were no cameras or bugs and taped her mouth with masking tape.

He told the victim: 'Since all of you want to film me, I will make love to you and let all of you see.' He then molested and raped her.

When his wife got home, Tam insisted that his stepdaughter was a member of an organisation out to harm him and he wanted her to feel remorse for the rest of her life for being unfaithful to him.

He then called the police.