A man with the incredible name of Batman bin Suparman has been jailed on theft and drug charges in Singapore.
The unemployed 23-year-old was reportedly arrested on August 19 after security videos showed him sneaking into a store at night on two seperate occasions, stealing a total of $400 USD.
Prior to his arrest, Suparman had become a minor Internet celebrity, with a picture of his unintentionally amusing ID card doing the rounds on social media since May 2008.
But according to Ben Zimmer, a language columnist for the Wall Street Journal, Suparman is a common name on the Indonesian island of Java, from which Suparman originally hails.
Batman, however, is not.
Zimmer told the BBC that he predicts Suparman's parents chose the name as a light-hearted reference to the superhero franchise.
"I see the name as this interesting juxtaposition of local naming with Western pop culture," says Zimmer.
