Amos Yee

Amos Yee Pang Sang (, born 31 October 1998) is a Singaporean convicted sex offender and former blogger, YouTuber, and child actor.

Amos Yee Pang Sang was born on 31 October 1998, in Singapore.

Yee was raised in Singapore and studied at Pei Chun Public School, where he took his Primary School Leaving Examination, and then attended Zhonghua Secondary School.

In March 2011, Yee won awards for Best Short Film and Best Actor at The New Paper's First Film Fest (FFF) for his film Jan.

The New Paper described Yee as having taken on four different acting roles in his "self-written, self-directed film", which was described as a "twisted dark comedy" in which a boy tries to persuade his three friends to help a cancer-stricken girl.

Yee, thirteen at the time, was described as having made the film "in his bedroom".

The FFF awarded Yee a video camera and video editing software.

Following the success of Jan, FFF chief judge Jack Neo offered an internship to Yee, and additionally invited Yee to audition for Neo's film, We Not Naughty, a film about juvenile delinquency.

Neo cast Yee in a minor acting role after Yee improvised and improved the language in a script given to him.

Yee played a "smart younger brother" to a lead actor's character, and was allowed by Neo to write his own dialogue.

Neo said that while Yee only had three scenes in the movie, they were "crucial," and praised Yee as a "natural comedian" with a passion for film-making.

Neo defended Yee against accusations of arrogance, saying "just because [Yee] acts arrogant doesn't mean he is ... He is an actor, he's playing a role" but also suggested that Yee needed to learn humility.

In January 2012, Yee was widely criticised by netizens for uploading a video to YouTube which—according to My Paper—"called the Chinese New Year a rip-off of the Western New Year's Day".

Garnering over 150,000 views, Yee later clarified that the video was satirical in nature.

The New Paper described Yee as "mocking the origins of the zodiac and joking about how children should be given a one-month holiday for Chinese New Year" in the video.

Within the video, Yee had also said that it was his "fake representation" of Chinese New Year.

Yee, who was raised Catholic, and began attending Mass independently of his family, considered himself a practicing Catholic, but in 2013 he was reportedly "kicked out" of service as an altar boy after swearing during a meeting.

After meeting with a priest to question his confirmation, and studying skeptical websites and videos, he became an atheist.

In late March 2015, shortly after the death of Lee Kuan Yew who is the former Prime Minister of Singapore, Yee uploaded a video on YouTube criticising Lee.

In the video, Yee compared Lee to Jesus, and cast both in what was considered an obscene and disrespectful light.

Yee also uploaded to his blog an image depicting Lee and Margaret Thatcher engaged in anal sex.

A subsequent 32 police reports resulted in Yee being arrested in Singapore and charged with "intention of wounding the religious feelings of Christians", obscenity, and "threatening, abusive or insulting communication."

Yee's trial drew significant public interest and the court found him guilty in May 2015, meting a jail sentence of four weeks which was backdated to include 53 days served in remand, freeing Yee immediately following the trial.

Yee appealed against both the court conviction and sentence.

Yee's imprisonment drew criticism from human rights organisations, including Amnesty International, which considered Yee to be a "prisoner of conscience".

According to The New York Times, prior to his 2015 Lee Kuan Yew video, Yee had uploaded "more than a dozen comedic riffs ... on subjects including Singapore's legal ban on homosexuality, The Hunger Games, Valentine's Day, Boyhood and the decision to drop out of school 'to pursue my "career" as a 17-year-old boy ranting in front of a video camera'."

Nathan Heller of The New Yorker also noted in 2015 that Yee had been publishing homemade videos which were "directed equally toward the Singaporean youth and a more international, American-style audience".

In August 2016, Yee was arrested for the second time and stood trial over six charges for deliberate intent to wound religious feelings and two charges for failure to turn up for police interviews.

In September 2016, Yee was sentenced to 6 weeks' jail and fined $2,000 for wounding religious feelings, which is under Section 298 of the Penal Code.

The presiding judge said that Yee's actions could "generate social unrest" and should not be condoned.

Yee began serving his jail term on 13 October 2016.

In December 2016, Yee fled to the United States just before his call-up for National Service, immediately seeking political asylum.

It was granted in March 2017 by the Chicago immigration court, despite being opposed by the U.S. federal government, which appealed the decision, causing Yee to be held in detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the appeal process.

Following an immigration appeals court's decision to uphold his bid for asylum, Yee was released in September 2017.

In November 2017, Yee received death threats for supporting pedophilia in videos and blog posts.

In May 2018, Yee's channel was removed by YouTube for violating community guidelines and Twitter suspended his account.

In July 2018, Yee's Patreon account was shut down.

As of December 2018, Yee's WordPress blog, personal Facebook page, were shut down.

In October 2020, Yee was arrested in Illinois on charges of solicitation in a case involving a 14-year-old, and possession of child pornography; he eventually pled guilty to two charges of child grooming and child pornography in exchange for a sentence of six years in prison, which he began serving in December 2021 at the Illinois River Correctional Center.

He was released on parole on 7 October 2023, but was rearrested for violating parole conditions a month later, and was transferred to the Stateville Correctional Centre.