PT Sandipala Arthaputra v STMicroelectronics Asia Pacific Pte Ltd and others

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: George Wei J
• Judgment Date: 30 January 2018
• Neutral Citation: [2018] SGHC 20
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Hearing Date: 12 January 2018
• Docket Number: Suit No 542 of 2012 (Summons No 5464 of 2017)
• Plaintiff Counsel: Davinder Singh s/o Amar Singh, Jaikanth Shankar, Jaspreet Singh Sachdev, Lin Xianyang Timothy and Low Wu Yang (Drew & Napier LLC)
• Defendant Counsel: Govintharash s/o Ramanathan and Shafkat Fahmid Sifat (Gurbani & Co LLC)
• Subject Matter: Contempt of Court,Civil contempt,Sentencing
• Published date: 20 July 2018

George Wei J: Introduction

Summons No 5464 of 2017 arises out of High Court Suit No 542 of 2012 (“the Substantive Proceedings”). The Substantive Proceedings concerned a dispute over a contract entered into around 9 December 2011 between the plaintiff, PT Sandipala Arthaputra (“Sandipala”), and the second defendant, Oxel Systems Pte Ltd (“Oxel”), for the supply of microchips (“chips”) from the first defendant, STMicroelectronics Asia Pacific Pte Ltd (“ST-AP”). These chips were needed to fulfil Sandipala’s obligations under an Indonesian Government contract or award to produce electronic identification cards for its citizens.

In the Substantive Proceedings, Oxel counterclaimed against Sandipala as well as Paulus Tannos (“Paulus”), Catherine Tannos (“Catherine”) and Lina Rawung (“Rawung”) for damages and sums due and owing to Oxel by Sandipala. The claim against Paulus, Catherine and Rawung was for conspiracy to injure Oxel by unlawful means.

I dismissed Sandipala’s claims in the Substantive Proceedings on 12 May 2017. Oxel obtained judgment on the counterclaim for some US$21.822m plus interest against Sandipala, Paulus and Catherine. Oxel’s counterclaim against Rawung was dismissed. The complete facts are set out in my earlier judgment, PT Sandipala Arthaputra v STMicroElectronics Asia Pacific and others [2017] SGHC 102 (“the Substantive Judgment”), and my supplemental judgment on interest, PT Sandipala Arthaputra v STMicroElectronics Asia Pacific and others [2017] SGHC 191.

Sandipala, Paulus and Catherine filed an appeal on 12 June 2017 against my substantive decision. No application was filed to stay the execution of the judgment in the Substantive Proceedings until 9 October 2017 (“the Stay Application”). By this time, Oxel had already applied for and obtained orders of court for the examination of Paulus and Catherine as judgment debtors.

The Stay Application was dismissed on 27 November 2017. Leave was granted to Oxel to commence committal proceedings against Paulus and Catherine for breaches of examination of judgment debtor orders (“the EJD Orders”). I heard Summons No 5464 of 2017, which was for an order of committal, on 12 January 2018.

After hearing the parties and considering the submissions, I found Paulus and Catherine to have committed wilful breaches of the EJD Orders and guilty of contempt of court. In the circumstances, I imposed a custodial sentence of seven days’ imprisonment each, commencing 15 January 2018, with costs. On being informed that Paulus and Catherine intended to appeal the committal decision, I ordered a stay of the order of committal until the hearing of the appeal of the committal order (“the Committal Appeal”). Certain consequential or supplementary orders were also made. These will be summarised later.

I now provide the grounds for my committal decision.

Background facts

The key background facts behind the substantive dispute are set out at [10]–[48] of the Substantive Judgment. For present purposes, it is sufficient to summarise the relationship between Sandipala, Paulus and Catherine. Sandipala is an Indonesian company that was incorporated in 1987. On or about 19 January 2011, Paulus purchased majority shares in Sandipala. Most of the purchased shares were placed under the name of his wife, Rawung. Paulus injected considerable capital into Sandipala. As at 4 March 2011, Sandipala’s management board consisted of Paulus (President Director), his daughter Catherine (Director), Pauline Tannos (Director) and Rawung (President Commissioner).

In or around June 2011, the Indonesian Government awarded a very substantial contract for the production and supply personalised electronic identification cards to a consortium of companies, of which Sandipala was a member. In brief, within the consortium, Sandipala was to produce and personalise large quantities of electronic identification cards in accordance with the tender award. To this end, Sandipala entered into an agreement with Oxel for some 100 million electronic chips encoded with a particular operating system (“the Oxel Contract”). These electronic chips were in turn sourced from and produced by the STMicroelectronics Group of companies, of which ST-AP is a member. The third defendant in the Substantive Proceedings, Vincent Pierre Luc Cousin (“Cousin”), is an employee of ST-AP.

Oxel is a Singapore company in the business of supplying electronic chips and had licensing rights to sell a software suite known as “PAC”. Disputes arose when Sandipala “discovered” that the electronic chips ordered and supplied could not be used for the personalised electronic identification card project that had been awarded. It is sufficient to note that there was a considerable dispute as to why the chips supplied could not be used and who was responsible. It was in this context that Sandipala brought the Substantive Proceedings against ST-AP and Oxel. The substantive claim was dismissed. Oxel succeeded in the counterclaim against Sandipala under the Oxel contract. Oxel also succeeded in the claim against Paulus and Catherine for conspiring through unlawful means to cause Sandipala to breach the Oxel contract.

Timeline of key events after delivery of the Substantive Judgment

It is convenient to set out a timeline of the key events post-delivery of the substantive judgment which culminated in Oxel’s application for an order of committal against Paulus and Catherine. To be clear, the timeline set out below does not include certain proceedings taken out by ST-AP and Cousin against Sandipala concerning an anti-suit injunction. These will be briefly touched on later.

Date	Event
12 May 2017	Substantive Judgment was delivered.
24 May 2017	Oxel sent a letter of demand to the judgment debtors.
2 June 2017	Oxel filed Summons No 2543 of 2017 (“SUM 2543”) for the examination of Paulus and Catherine as judgment debtors and officers of Sandipala (“EJD 1”).
5 June 2017	EJD 1 was granted. Paulus and Catherine were ordered to attend the examination of judgment debtor hearing (“EJD hearing”) on 19 June 2017.
10 June 2017	Oxel’s counsel, Drew & Napier LLC (“D&N”), sent a letter to Paulus and Catherine’s counsel, Gurbani & Co LLC (“G&C”), seeking confirmation as whether GC had instructions to accept service of the order on 5 June 2017. No response was received. D&N made unsuccessful attempts to serve the order on Paulus and Catherine by personal service.
12 June 2017	Sandipala, Paulus and Catherine filed their appeal against the Substantive Judgment.
19 June 2017	Oxel obtained adjournment of the 19 June 2017 examination hearing to 10 July 2017 as they had not been able to effect service. Paulus, Catherine and G&C did not attend the hearing on 19 June 2017.
21 June 2017	Oxel obtained an order re-fixing the date of EJD hearing to 17 July 2017 on the account of its counsel’s schedule.
21 June 2017 to 3 August 2017	Oxel made further unsuccessful attempts to effect personal service on Paulus and Catherine. Oxel requested and obtained an adjournment of the 17 July 2017 EJD hearing to 21 August 2017 to make further attempts to effect service and apply for such orders on service as appropriate.
21 August 2017	Oxel was still unable to effect personal service. The EJD hearing was adjourned again to enable Oxel to make further attempts to effect service and to apply for an order of substituted service. The court ordered Paulus and Catherine in their capacities as judgment debtors and as officers of Sandipala to attend for an EJD hearing on 25 September 2017. This order was endorsed with a penal notice.
24 and 25 August 2017	Oxel made two more unsuccessful attempts to effect personal service.
30 August 2017	Oxel applied for leave to serve the 21 August 2017 order and questionnaires (“the EJD Questionnaires”) by way of substituted service on G&C.
5 September 2017	The court granted Oxel’s application for substituted service and observed that G&C was still acting for the judgment debtors and that Paulus and Catherine were evading service by not instructing solicitors to accept service or by evading personal service.
8 September 2017	Oxel effected substituted service of the 21 August 2017 order on G&C and enclosed the EJD Questionnaires.
25 September 2017	Paulus, Catherine and G&C did not attend the EJD hearing. Shortly before the hearing, D&N (for Oxel) called G&C to enquire whether Paulus and Catherine would be attending court. The reply was “I think my clients are in China” and “I think they are not turning up”. Answers to the EJD Questionnaires were not provided. The court ordered Paulus and Catherine to attend on 11 October 2017 for examination and to produce the books and documents on matters relating to the EJD hearing.
6 October 2017	Oxel served the 25 September 2017 order by letter and attachments to G&C, endorsed with the penal notice.
9 October 2017	The judgment debtors filed the Stay Application against: (i) execution of the judgment and (ii) enforcement of the 25 September 2017 order, pending the substantive appeal.
11 October 2017	Again, Paulus and Catherine failed to appear at the EJD hearing and did not provide answers to the EJD Questionnaires. Shortly before the hearing, D&N called G&C and enquired whether Paulus and Catherine were attending. D&N was informed that Paulus and Catherine would not be attending and that the Stay Application had been filed. The court was informed. D&N put on record that this was the second breach by Paulus and Catherine of an Order of Court. The court ordered Paulus and Catherine to attend for an EJD hearing on 1 November 2017.
24 October 2017	Oxel served the 11 October 2017 order by letter and attachments to G&C, endorsed with the penal notice and enclosing the EJD Questionnaires.

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