District Judge Shaiffudin Bin Saruwan:
Introduction
The Accused is Ko King Lik Benson. On 25 May 2014, he had registered his marriage to an Indonesian national, Dian Evasari Wijaya (“Dian”). Subsequent to that marriage, he had gone with Dian to the Immigration and Checkpoint Authority (“ICA”) on five occasions to make applications for Visit Pass (“VP”), Long Term Visit Pass (“LTVP”) and Permanent Residence (“PR”) for Dian. In all these applications, Dian was the applicant. The Accused had acted as her sponsor.
As the sponsor in these applications, the Accused had to, inter alia, declare all his marriages, including customary marriages, in the application forms. However, he had omitted to declare his marriage to a Hong Kong resident named Yuk Yee Ling (“Yuk”). Despite the omissions, he had signed the forms which included the declaration that the statements that he had made in the forms were true and correct. Therefore, the Accused had made false statements to ICA.
He claimed trial to the five charges. He was not represented by counsel.
The charges
The five charges were for offences under s 57(1)(k) punishable under s 57(1)(vi) of the Immigration Act (Cap 133)(“IA”). The details were as follow –
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| Date | Application for | Exhibit marking |
| 26 Sep 14 | VP for Dian (Form 14) | P22 |
| 10 Oct 14 | VP for Dian (Form 14) | P23 |
| 12 Feb 15 | PR for Dian (Form 4) | P15 |
| 16 Mar 15 | LTVP for Dian (Form 14B) | P17 |
| 7 May 15 | LTVP for Dian (Form 14B) | P19 |
The trial
The prosecution’s case
The prosecution’s case in relation to the five charges were – On 16 March 2015 and 7 May 2015, the Accused had gone to the Visitor Services Centre (“VSC”) at ICA to submit two application forms for LTVP (“Form 14B”). Dian was the applicant and he was her sponsor. In “Part 1(B): Marital Status and History” of the application forms, he had declared his previous local marriages with Cheong Oi Yeng (“Cheong”) and Alicia Lim Lee Hwee (“Alicia Lim”). The prosecution contended that he had knowingly omitted to declare his marriage to Yuk. At the relevant time, his marriage with Yuk was still subsisting as the decree nisi absolute had not been obtained. Despite the omissions, the accused person had signed the application forms. In doing so, he had declared that the statements that he had made in the two application forms were true and correct. He knew that the declarations were false. On 26 September 2014 and 10 October 2014, the Accused had gone to the VSC to submit two applications for LTVP (“Form 14”). Dian was the applicant and he was her sponsor. In “Part II Sponsor” of the forms, found at the annex of the Form 14, he had to declare all his marriages, including customary marriages. The Accused had only declared his previous local marriages with Cheong and Alicia Lim on the Form 14 dated 26 September 2014. In the Form 14 dated 10 October 2014, he had entered “NA” or “not applicable”. He had knowingly omitted to declare his marriage to Yuk in both these forms. Despite the omissions, he had signed the two forms. In doing so, he had declared that the statements that he had made in the two Form 14 were true and correct. He knew that the declarations were false. On 12 February 2015, the Accused and Dian had gone to the Permanent Residence Services Centre (“PRSC”) at ICA to apply for permanent residence for Dian. Dian was the applicant and he had acted as her sponsor. In the application form (“Form 4”) at “Part F – Sponsor’s Particulars”, the Accused was asked to declare all his marriages, including customary marriages. He had only declared his two previous local marriages to Cheong and Alicia Lim. He had knowingly not declared his marriage to Yuk. Despite this omission, he had signed the form. In doing so, he had declared that the statement that he had made in the Form 4 was true and correct. He knew that this declaration was false.
The offences were discovered when the Accused made a citizenship application for his son from his marriage to Dian in August 2015. In the course of processing the citizenship application, ICA discovered that the Accused had previously sponsored similar citizenship applications in 2010 and 2014 for his two children from his marriage to Yuk. In these applications, the Accused had made two statutory declarations stating that as of 19 Oct 10 and 24 Feb 14, Yuk was his one and only wife. This information was relayed to the staff at PRSC.
ASP Teo Geok Cheng (“ASP Teo”) was the senior processing officer at the PRSC at the time. She was the approving officer in relation to Dian’s PR application. After she was alerted to the information regarding the Accused’s marriage to Yuk, she had retrieved the PR application form (P15) and found that the Accused had not declared his marriage to Yuk in the said form. She then referred the matter to the Enforcement Command of ICA for further investigation. Consequently, the omissions in all the other application forms in P17, P19, P22 and P23 were revealed.
ASP Teo described the process how a PR application was submitted at the PRSC. She said that when the application form was submitted at the PRSC counter, the officer at the counter would check to confirm that the form was correctly filled up and signed. The officer would also verify the duplicate copies of all the relevant documents attached against the original documents. She also said that the applicant and sponsor would append their signatures at the counter. Subsequently, the forms would be handed over to a procession officer like herself for approval or rejection. In the course of processing the application, she would also conduct her own checks using the ICA systems.
ASP Teo confirmed that when the Accused had appended his signature on the application form, he was making the declaration that everything stated in the form were true. She also testified that the phrase “all other marriages (including customary marriages)” at Part F of P15 referred to marriages contracted in Singapore or overseas, including such marriages which were not formally registered.
The prosecution’s case was that the Accused had been wilfully blind to what the phrase “all marriages” and “all other marriages” in the respective forms had meant. He had not made any effort to ascertain or verify with the staff at ICA what the phrases had meant.
The defence’s case
The Accused’s defence, as it could be gleaned from his examination-in-chief, were as follow – He did not intentionally omit to declare his marriage to Yuk. He added that he did not stand to benefit from not declaring that marriage in the application forms; The Accused had not filled up the application forms himself. The entries were made by Dian and he had relied on Dian to ensure that the information was true and correct; Dian had been given the impression by the ICA staff that only local marriages should be declared in conformity with his marriage record with the Registry of Marriages; The phrases “all marriages” and “all other marriages” in the application forms were only referring to local marriages. There was nothing in the phrases that suggested that they included marriages contracted overseas. He made references to other parts of the same application forms where it was expressly stated that the information that were required to be declared were either ‘local’ or ‘overseas’.
The issues to be determined
The issues to be determined were as follow – The Accused knew or has reason to believe that he had to declare both his local and overseas marriages; and Did the Accused make the five false statements in the application forms.
Analysis of the evidence
It would be useful to set out the relevant phrases in the five application forms that the prosecution alleged the Accused had failed to comply with –
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| Form 14B (16 Mar 15) (Exhibit P17) | “please declare all marriages (including customary marriages)” |
| Form 14B (7 May 15) (Exhibit P19) |
| Form 4 (12 Feb 15) (Exhibit P15) | “Particulars of Sponsor’s All Other Marriages (Including Customary Marriages)” |
| Form 14 (26 Sep 14) (Exhibit P22) |
| Form 14 (10 Oct 14) (Exhibit P23) |
The following facts were not in dispute – The five application forms were filled up by Dian who used the Accused’s SingPass with his consent to access the forms in the ICA website. Upon the completion of the forms, a date was then scheduled for Dian and the Accused to attend at VSC and PRSC. On the appointment date, the printed forms with supporting documents were then submitted at the VSC and PRSC counters. At the point of submissions of the forms, both Dian and the Accused signed the declarations that the contents in the forms were true and correct. The forms and the supporting documents were checked by the officers at the counter. At the time when the Accused signed the five application forms, he knew that he was previously married to Yuk, and that the marriage was solemnised in Hong Kong on 14 February 2010 (Exhibit P11). He also knew that divorce proceedings were then underway in Hong Kong. The marriage was only dissolved by a decree nisi absolute on 30 July 2018. At the time when he signed the declarations in the five application forms, his marriage to Yuk was not declared in the said forms. By signing on the application forms, the Accused had declared that the statements made by Dian and him in the said application forms were true (vide Form 4), were true and correct (vide Form 14B) and, were true and correct to the best of his knowledge, and that he had not wilfully suppressed any material fact (vide Form 14). The Accused was present on each occasion when Dian submitted the five applications at the VSC and PRSC at ICA. Dian had handed the forms to the Accused and had asked him to check before he signed the forms. After the Accused had signed the forms, she submitted them to the staff at the...
