Public Prosecutor v Li Yong De

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Salina Bte Ishak
• Judgment Date: 21 June 2021
• Neutral Citation: [2021] SGDC 115
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: District Arrest Case No 910471 of 2020 & Ors, Magistrate’s Appeal No 9132 of 2021
• Published date: 26 June 2021
• Year: 2021
• Hearing Date: 19 March 2021,25 May 2021,16 April 2021,31 May 2021
• Plaintiff Counsel: Eric Hu and Shamini Joseph (Attorney-General's Chambers) and Ramesh Chandra (Insolvency & Public Trustee's Office)
• Defendant Counsel: Seah Choon Huat Johnny (Seah & Co)
• Subject Matter: Criminal Procedure and Sentencing,Criminal Law,Offences,Penal Code,Criminal Breach of Trust by a Servant,Falsification of Accounts,Cheating and Dishonestly Inducing Delivery of Property,Statutory Offences,Corruption, Drug Trafficking and Other Serious Crimes (Confiscation of Benefits) Act,Using Benefits of Criminal Conduct,Pawnbrokers Act 2015,Providing False Information to the Registrar
• Citation: [2021] SGDC 115

District Judge Salina Bte Ishak: Background

The Accused, Mr Li Yong De, a 35 year-old Singapore citizen faced a total of 23 charges and had pleaded guilty to the following eight charges: One amalgamated charge under s 408 of the Penal Code (Cap 224, 2008 Rev Ed) read with s 124(4) of the Criminal Procedure Code (Cap 68, 2012 Rev Ed) in DAC 910471 of 2020; One amalgamated charge under s 477A of the Penal Code (Cap 224, 2008 Rev Ed) read with s 124(4) of the Criminal Procedure Code (Cap 68, 2012 Rev Ed) in DAC 910476 of 2020; One amalgamated charge under s 420 of the Penal Code (Cap 224, 2008 Rev Ed) read with s 124(4) of the Criminal Procedure Code (Cap 68, 2012 Rev Ed) in DAC 910478 of 2020; One charge under s 47(1)(c) of the Corruption, Drug Trafficking and Other Serious Crimes (Confiscation of Benefits) Act (Cap 65A, Rev Ed 2000)(“CDSA”) and punishable under s 47(6)(a) of the same Act in DAC 910483 of 2020 and Four charges under s 70(1)(a) of the Pawnbrokers Act 2015 and punishable under s 70(2) of the said Act in MSC 901024 of 2020 to MSC 901027 of 2020.

The Accused consented to 15 of the remaining charges namely: One charge under s 408 of the Penal Code; One charge under s 417 of the Penal Code; One charge under s 477A of the Penal Code; Four charges under s 47(1)(c) CDSA and punishable under s 47(6)(a) of the same Act and eight charges under s 70(1)(a) of the Pawnbrokers Act 2015 being taken into consideration for purposes of sentencing.

The Accused admitted to the facts in both the Statements of Fact ie Exhibit PS1 and Exhibit PS2 without qualification save for paragraph 38 of Exhibit PS1.

Newton hearing

As the Accused had disputed paragraph 38 of the Statement of Facts in Exhibit PS1, in particular the nature of the agreement relating to the transfer of 516,429 shares in Sin Lian Pawnshop Pte Ltd belonging to his parents, Tio Ai Chu and Lee Kim Boon to SK Properties Pte Ltd, I conducted a Newton hearing to determine this issue.

The crux of the matter was whether the transfer of his parents’ shares amounted to a full restitution of the monies the Accused had misappropriated from Sin Lian Pawnshop Pte Ltd. It was the Defence’s case that there was an oral agreement between the parties to use his parents’ shares in SLP to offset against the at least S$5,431,900 he had misappropriated.

After a careful consideration of the evidence as well as the written submissions by both the Prosecution and the Defence, I ruled that the agreement between the Accused’s parents was a commercial decision and did not amount to a full restitution of the at least S$5,431,900 that the Accused had misappropriated from SLP.

On 31 May 2021, after a careful consideration of the Prosecution’s address on sentence, his plea in mitigation and in view of his overall criminality, I had sentenced him as follows:

S/No	Charge No.	Sentence	Consecutive
1	DAC-910471 of 2020	Eight years’ imprisonment	Consecutive
2	DAC-910476 of 2020	Three years’ imprisonment	Concurrent
3	DAC-910478 of 2020	Six years’ imprisonment	Consecutive
4	DAC 910483 of 2020	One year’s imprisonment	Concurrent
5	MSC 901024 of 2020	Fine of $15,000 in default five weeks' imprisonment
6	MSC 901025 of 2020	Fine of $15,000 in default five weeks' imprisonment.
7	MSC 901026 of 2020	Fine of $15,000 in default five weeks' imprisonment.
8	MSC 901027 of 2020	Fine of $15,000, in default five weeks' imprisonment
	Total Sentence	14 years' imprisonment and fine of $60,000 in default twenty weeks' imprisonment.

As the Accused had been remanded since 16 June 2020, I ordered the aggregate imprisonment term of 14 years' imprisonment to take effect from his date of remand. His fine of $60,000 remains unpaid.

The Accused being dissatisfied with my decision filed his Notice of Appeal against his sentence on 4 June 2021. He is presently serving his sentence and his earliest date of release is on 17 January 2030.

Having set out the background for the present case, I now provide the reasons for my decision.

Salient Facts

Sin Lian Pawnshop Pte Ltd (“SLP”) is a pawnshop in the business of offering secured loans to customers in exchange for the customers pledging valuable items which are used as collateral for the loan. SLP would keep records of the transactions and issue pawn tickets which reflected the customer’s name, the loan value, the monthly interest rate (pegged to a percentage of the loan had amount), a description of the pledged item, and the expiry date of the pawn ticket. Each pawn ticket had a six-month validity period. The customer has the option of renewing the pawn ticket by servicing the interest. The interest after one month was 1% of the loan amount but would increase to 1.5% of the loan amount if the interest was serviced after two months or more. Each renewal would result in a fresh pawn ticket issued for the same pledged item and be valid for another six months from the date of extension. If the customer failed to redeem his pledge by repaying the loan within the validity period of the pawn ticket, SLP was entitled to deal with the pledged item as it saw fit.

The Accused was the Managing Director of SLP. He first joined SLP as a valuer. He was thereafter promoted and was registered as a director in 2010. Subsequently, he became Managing Director of SLP.

At the material time, he was employed as a servant by SLP and was responsible for running the day-to-day operations of the pawnshop. He received a basic monthly salary of $4,500, monthly CPF contributions, as well as an allowance. His responsibilities included valuing luxury watches and jewellery and conducting daily checks on SLP’s cash float. In his capacity as a servant, he was entrusted with dominion over property belonging to SLP such as the funds in SLP’s bank account, its cash float, as well as the sales proceeds from the sale of SLP’s pledges such as watches and jewellery.

SLP maintained a corporate current account with United Overseas Bank (“UOB”) (account no. XXX) (“SLP’s UOB account”). Cheque withdrawals from SLP’s UOB account required at least two signatures by the authorised signatories to the UOB account. At the material time, there were three authorised signatories to the UOB account – the Accused, Lee Kim Boon (his father and Chairman of SLP at the time), and Soh Bong Seng (one of the directors of SLP at the time).

Facts relating to the charge of Criminal Breach of Trust As A Servant under s 408 Penal Code – DAC 910471 of 2020

In 2011, the shareholders of SLP set up a peripheral watch and jewellery business, Sin Lian Watch & Jewellery Pte Ltd, which was located within SLP’s premises and which would purchase unredeemed pledges from SLP. The Accused was placed in charge of this business, and he ran both businesses concurrently.

Sometime in 2013, the Accused wanted to buy over Sin Lian Watch & Jewellery Pte Ltd. To fund this purchase, sometime around June 2013, he made unauthorised cash cheque withdrawals from SLP’s UOB account amounting to S$350,000. He was able to do so as he had previously obtained Soh Bong Seng’s signatures on the blank cheques for the purpose of running SLP’s daily operations. He thus purchased and renamed Sin Lian Watch & Jewellery Pte Ltd as Prestige Watches & Jewellery Pte Ltd (“Prestige”). He was employed as a servant by Prestige and received a basic monthly salary and monthly CPF contributions. In his capacity as a servant, he was entrusted with dominion over the goods owned by Prestige, including its watches.

To cover up his dishonest misappropriation of the S$350,000 from SLP to fund his purchase of Prestige, the Accused balanced the deficit in SLP’s accounts by dishonestly misappropriating 30 watches from Prestige, valued at S$200,000, by pawning these 30 watches to SLP under a single pawn ticket (no. B/0713/01938) under one Leow Fan Siew’s name in July 2013. This gave the appearance that SLP had given a loan of S$200,000 to Leow Fan Siew, with 30 watches pledged as collateral. The Accused accounted for the remaining S$150,000 in cash by utilising the monies from SLP’s cash float.

From August 2013 to November 2013, the Accused renewed the pawn ticket backed by the 30 watches monthly, by servicing the monthly interest of 1% of the value of the pawn ticket using monies he misappropriated from SLP. Sometime on or around January 2014, he sold nine of the watches and redeemed part of the pawn ticket – he split the single pawn ticket valued at S$200,000 (which was backed by the 30 watches) into 21 pawn tickets amounting to S$150,000 in total, with each pawn ticket backed with one watch. He then sold the remaining 21 watches but continued servicing the monthly interest of the 1% of these 21 pawn tickets.

He continued to further dishonestly misappropriate monies from SLP using various methods, including: Making withdrawals from SLP’s UOB account via cash cheques and utilizing the monies for unauthorized purposes. The Accused admitted that that he had misappropriated about 90% of the cash cheque withdrawals he made; Pocketing the sales proceeds from the sale of watches belonging to SLP; Pocketing cash from SLP’s cash float, which included payments made by SLP’s customers for renewal of their pawn tickets or redemption of pledges.

To cover up his dishonest misappropriation, he created fake pawn tickets under Leow Fan Siew’s and Lee Wee Boon’s names to create the illusion that SLP had given out loans in exchange for pledges, when there were no such pledges in reality.

The Accused claimed that he utilised the misappropriated monies to, inter alia: Service the interest payments on the pawn tickets each month, failing which his actions would have been discovered as there were no pledges backing the...