Public Prosecutor v Lim Seng Khoon

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Jill Tan Li Ching
• Judgment Date: 16 March 2010
• Neutral Citation: [2010] SGDC 109
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Year: 2010
• Citation: [2010] SGDC 109
• Plaintiff Counsel: Ang Feng Qian (Deputy Public Prosecutor)
• Defendant Counsel: SK Kumar (SK Kumar & Associates)
• Published date: 23 March 2010

16 March 2010

District Judge Jill Tan

1 The Accused faced 32 charges. One was under section 182 of the Penal Code (Chapter 224) for giving false information to a public servant (“the Penal Code offence”), and 31 were under section 5(a)(i) of the Prevention of Corruption Act (Chapter 241), for corruptly receiving gratification to assume criminal liability on behalf of one Yao Hongqing (“Yao”) (“the corruption offences”). He pleaded guilty to the Penal Code offence and five of the corruption offences. The remaining 26 charges were taken into consideration for the purpose of sentencing. I sentenced him to a total of eight months’ and two weeks’ imprisonment. He has appealed against this sentence.

Facts

2 The players in this matter included the Accused, Yao and one Ong Tat Wei (“Ong”). Ong was an Assistant Superintendent of Police with the Singapore Police Force (“SPF”) at the material time. Yao was a Chinese national and was in a relationship with Ong. The Accused was acquainted with Ong, having been colleagues with him in the SPF. The Accused was no longer a police officer at the time of the offences as he left the SPF in 1997.

3 In November 2004, Yao and Ong decided to set up a business to cater to Chinese nationals studying in Singapore. To this end, on 1 December 2004, a sole proprietorship named S&T Educational Services (“S&T”) was registered in Yao’s name. This was because Ong was with the SPF at the time and could not register himself as a director of S&T. However, he drew up the business plan, set up a mailing address and enlisted persons to solicit for business for S&T.

4 Yao then came up with an idea of having sponsors who would make false statements to the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (“ICA”), so that entry visas would be granted to Chinese nationals. Yao would instruct Ong to fill in the requisite ICA form with the false information, after which Ong would arrange for sponsors to sign on the forms containing false declarations. In this regard, the Accused was recruited by Ong to join S&T. The Accused’s role was to solicit foreigners to enlist S&T’s services, and thereafter make false declarations as a sponsor in the ICA form for entry visas. For every successful visa application where he acted as the sponsor, the Accused would be paid $250 by Yao.

5 Some time in April 2005, Ong informed the Accused that one Huang Xiumei (“Huang”) was interested in coming to Singapore, and instructed the Accused to be Huang’s local sponsor. On 6 April 2005, Ong filled in the requisite ICA form, stating that Huang was the Accused’s girlfriend and was coming to Singapore to visit the Accused, when this was not true. The Accused then signed on the form, which was submitted to one Awe Wan Peng (“Awe”), a Customer Services Executive at ICA. Huang was granted an entry visa to Singapore as a result, and Yao handed $250 to Ong, who paid the money to the Accused for acting as a sponsor for Huang. The Accused knew that the false information in the form was likely to cause Awe to grant an entry visa to Huang, which Awe ought not to have done if the true facts were known to her. This formed the basis of the Penal Code offence, DAC 17849/2009.

6 As business at S&T was poor, Yao decided to open a massage parlour. She asked Ong to find a licencee for the massage parlour because she had already used her name for the registration of S&T and her immigration status did not allow her to also be registered as the licencee for the massage parlour. Ong asked the Accused to be the licencee of the massage parlour, and to assume any criminal liability arising from the massage parlour. The Accused would be paid $300 monthly for this. He had no other role in the running of the massage parlour. The Accused agreed, and became the licencee of Dream Beauty and Spa at Peninsula Plaza. From May to November 2005, Yao paid Ong the $300 monthly, which Ong was to hand to the Accused. From May to July 2005, Ong passed on the full gratification of $300 to the Accused. These formed the bases for three of the corruption offences that the Accused pleaded guilty to: DAC 17851/2009, DAC 17852/2009 and DAC 178583/2009. However, Ong subsequently split up the payments because he believed that the Accused would spend the money if the whole sum was given to him. Thus, from August to November 2005, Ong split the gratification into amounts ranging from $10 to $260 before giving them to the Accused. This had the effect of inflating the number of charges that the Accused faced, for he thus received money from Ong on many more occasions, albeit for smaller amounts each time. Two further corruption charges, for receiving $260 (DAC 17858/2009) and $90 (DAC 17879/2009) were proceeded on for the Accused’s guilty plea. The remaining 26 charges were taken into consideration for the purpose of sentencing. He received a total gratification of $1940.

7 Yao was dealt with in February 2009 and faced ten charges. She pleaded guilty to two charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act (for corruptly giving gratification) and one under the Penal Code (for making a false statement to a public servant). The remaining charges were taken into consideration for the purpose of sentencing. She was sentenced to a fine of $10000 for each corruption charge and a fine of $1000 for the Penal Code charge.

8 Ong faced 31 charges under section 5(b)(i) read with section 29(a) of the Prevention of Corruption Act (for corruptly giving gratification), which mirrored the charges faced by the Accused. He faced a further three charges under section 182 read with section 109 of the Penal Code (for abetting the sponsors to make false declarations to ICA). He pleaded guilty to five charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act, and to one under the Penal Code. The remaining charges were taken into consideration for the purpose of sentencing. As Ong and the Accused were dealt with together by me, I will briefly explain my reasons for the sentence I imposed on Ong as well, as each man’s sentence is better understood in relation to the other’s.

Mitigation

9 The Accused had two dissimilar previous convictions – one in 1998 for gaming in a common gaming house, and one in 2006 for promoting/conducting a private lottery without a permit. Counsel contended that the Accused’s role in the...