SINGAPORE- A Malaysian national was jailed for three years and ordered to be given three strokes of the cane on Thursday for molesting an 11-year-old boy.

Lee Kok Long, 26, pleaded guilty to pushing the 11-year-old boy into a toilet cubicle and grabbing his private parts at Fuchun Community Club in Woodlands on Dec 7 last year.

He also admitted to stealing two mobile phones worth $496 from a unit at Block 314 Woodlands Street 31 about eight months earlier.

The court heard that Lee was in the club's toilet when he peeped through a hole in the partition and saw the victim.

When the boy came out, Lee pushed him back in, closed the door and molested him.The boy ran away, and told his father what had happened at home.

They looked for Lee and the boy spotted him at the void deck of a block of flats in Woodlands Street 31. The father confronted Lee and called the police.

In April last year Lee had been walking along the flat corridor in the early hours of the morning when he saw, through an open door, a man asleep with two phones on another bed nearby.

He managed to get his hands on the phones with a 1.5m rod.

Lee sold one of the phones for $550, while the other was recovered when he was arrested.

He could have been jailed for up to 10 years and caned for wrongfully restraining and molesting a person under 14 years old. For theft, the maximum penalty is seven years jail and a fine.