A man who ate a teenager’s cigarette to allow the teen to avoid enforcement action by the National Environment Agency (NEA) was fined S$1,000 (US$744) by a court on Tuesday (Jul 30).

In mitigation, 53-year-old Ramamoorthy Reddiar Jayaraman said he did not know it was an offence to eat a cigarette in Singapore.

The judge told him it was not an offence, and that he could eat as many cigarettes as he wished, but obstructing an NEA officer was the offence he was facing.

Court documents did not state if the cigarette was lit or not.