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A former security guard who was unhappy with a colleague took drastic measures to teach the woman a lesson: By squirting hand sanitiser into her water bottle.

Dilip Kumar Gobind, 49, claimed that his 54-year-old colleague liked to gossip about other people, and wanted to squirt sanitiser into her bottle to "sanitizer (sic) her mouth" as a joke.

According to CNA, Dillip was fined S$4,500 on Thursday (Sep. 23) for one count of a rash act likely to cause hurt.

The act was caught on CCTV

According to court documents seen by Mothership, the incident took place at a condominium near Marine Parade, where both parties were working as security officers.

On April 13, 2020, the woman took a drink from her water bottle while she was on duty, and tasted a strong taste of hand sanitiser.

She then spat out the water, and felt pain in her throat.

Dillip's colleague informed the condominium's operations officer, who reviewed the CCTV footage of the guard house area, and found out that Dillip was responsible for putting hand sanitiser into his colleague's water bottle.

Further investigations revealed that Dillip was on the night shift the night before, when he decided to play a prank on her.

He took her water bottle and squired at least two pumps of hand sanitiser inside, which was half-filled with water.

Dillip then placed the water bottle back to its original location.

Diluted solution unlikely to cause serious injury

The victim lodged a police report two days after the incident.

A clinical toxicologist stated in a report that the hand sanitiser, if swallowed, could cause pain, irritation or damage to the throat, oesophagus, and stomach.

He also stated that consumption of the sanitizer-laced water is likely to cause irritation to the throat, which can result in pain.

However, he noted that the degree of injury depends on the concentration of the chemicals and the amount ingested, and that a diluted solution is unlikely to cause serious injury.

Spur of the moment

According to CNA, Dillip claimed to have done it in the spur of the moment, and told the court that he regretted his actions.

In response, the judge told him that he had endangered the safety of his colleague in the workplace, and brought up the breach of trust in his actions.

Dillip could have been jailed for a year, fined up to S$5,000, or both for committing a rash act causing hurt.

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