Public Prosecutor v Sanimah bte Jurime

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Roy Grenville Neighbour
• Judgment Date: 29 April 2003
• Neutral Citation: [2003] SGDC 102
• Published date: 06 October 2003
• Year: 2003
• Citation: [2003] SGDC 102
• Defendant Counsel: Santwant Singh (Sim Mong Tech & Partners),Vaz (Public Prosecutor)
• Court: District Court (Singapore)

1 The accused claimed trial to two charges namely:

DAC 46299/02

“You,

Saminah Binte Jurime, f/37 years

NRIC No S1735997E, Singaporean

are charged that you on the 26^th day of January 2002, at the carpark of Loyang Point Shopping Centre, Singapore, being a servant employed by Jacin Security Services, to wit a car park attendant, and in such capacity entrusted with cash belonging to Metro Parking (S) Pte Ltd did commit criminal breach of trust of $320/- from the cash collection dated 25 Jan 2002 converting it to your own use, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 408 of the Penal Code, Chapter 224”.

DAC 46300/02

“You,

Sanimah Bte Jurime, f/37 years,

NRIC No S173599E, Singaporean

are charged that you on the 28^th day of January 2002 at the carpark of Loyang Point Shopping Centre, Singapore, did dishonestly retain stolen property, to wit cash $257/- from the carpark collection dated 27 January 2002 belonging to Metro Parking (S) Pte Ltd, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 411 of the Penal Code, Chapter 224”.

At the conclusion of the trial the accused was convicted on both charges. For the offence of criminal breach of trust as a servant, the accused was sentenced to 10 weeks imprisonment and to 3 weeks imprisonment for the offence of dishonestly retaining stolen property. Sentences of imprisonment were ordered to run concurrently. Dissatisfied, the accused has appealed against conviction and sentence. The accused is currently serving sentence.

The Facts

2 The prosecution adduced evidence that Jacin Security Services (“Jacin Security”) was engaged by Metro Parking (S) Pte Ltd (“Metro Parking”) to manage its car park at Loyang Point Shopping Centre. In managing the car park, Jacin Security employs and assigns daily two car park attendants cum cashiers to collect monies due to Metro Parking, from motorists who park their cars at a multi-storied car park (Car Park 51). Lorries and heavy vehicles are parked at a car park (Car Park 50) beside the Shopping Centre.

3 At Loyang Point Shopping Centre the car park attendant’s booth is situated at the entrance to the car park. The car park is an automated one in that motorists have to take a ticket from the automated dispenser upon entering the Car Park. Payment for parking can be made at two Automated Pay Station machines (APS’)or at the cashier’s booth. One automated machine, “APS 15” is situated on the ground floor of the shopping centre and the other “APS 17” is situated on the third floor. These machines and the computer system operating them are serviced and maintained for Metro Parking by technicians from Designa Parking & Access Pte Ltd (Designa). A computer system links the two APS machines to a MACA machine in the cashier’s booth. The MACA machine is used to issue receipts when payment for parking charges is made at the cashier’s booth. When payment is made at an APS machine, the car park ticket is validated allowing the motorist to leave the car park unrestricted by the barrier at the car park’s exit. Motorists have a choice of paying for parking at the attendants’ booth where the car park attendants on duty validate the ticket

4 Evidence was adduced that from September 2001 till April 2002 the accused was employed at a salary of $1,150 by Jacin Security as car park attendant cum cashier. The accused was stationed at Loyang Point Shopping Centre car park. The accused who had experience working as a car park attendant cum cashier for Metro Parking before was recommended for the job at Jacin Security as car park attendant by (PW2) Noordin Bin Salim (Noordin) a supervisor with Metro Parking. Noordin supervised the accused and other car park attendants at Loyang Point.

5 The staff on duty at Loyang Point Car park man the car park from 7.00am till 10.30pm daily from a car park booth. There are two 12-hour shifts. One shift is from 7.00am. till 7.30pm. The other is from 10.30am to 10.30pm.

6 In January 2002, the accused and (PW1) Razilawaty Binte Rasif (“Waty”) were working together as car park attendants cum cashiers at Loyang Point car park. The accused worked the 7.00am to 7.30pm shift and Waty worked the 10.30am to 10.30pm shift. At the material time, was one William Yap an employee of Jacin Security worked with the accused and Waty. In September or October 2002 he had left the employ of Jacin Security. He and the accused provided Waty with on the job training.

7 The accused, as car park attendant, was entrusted to collect and record the daily car park collections in a Daily Report. The Daily report is usually submitted with supporting documents, namely a “Z” report, Cash book report, Protocol or Alarm Report, to Metro Parking’s supervisor Noordin who would in turn send the reports to Metro Parking’s headquarters for auditing. The accused duties specifically required her to open and collect the monies from the two APS machines in the morning when she reported for work. The accused would count all the previous days collections, which included collections paid manually by motorcyclists, fill in a Daily Report, attach the supporting documents for the collections, fill in a bank deposit slip for the collections and bank in the money into any one of three bank accounts that Metro Parking’s had at Overseas Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC), Development Bank of Singapore (DBS) or United Overseas Bank (UOB).

8 The “Z” report is a report that is automatically generated by the two APS machines whenever the front panel door of the machines are opened and the note vaults and coin boxes in the machine are removed for collection. The note vaults and the coin boxes are opened by separate keys which when turned automatically triggers the printing of the “Z” report. The keys to the note vault and the coin boxes are common to both machines. An exposed dot matrix printer in the APS machines prints the report on a roll of paper. Details such as the date, time and the amount of money in the note vault boxes and coin boxes are recorded. After printing the report the print head cuts the roll and the report is retrieved. After removing the money from the machine, the machine is topped up with coins. Coins are put into the coin hoppers to return change to customers. To fill the coin hoppers a function card is inserted into the machine reader to open the coin slot. The display on the machine indicates the amount of money to be replenished and the refilling is proceeded with. When this is completed, the cancel button is pressed and the machine generates a Refill report. This refilling procedure can be performed with the front panel door of the machine open or closed.

9 The Cash Book report and the Protocol or Alarm report are reports generated by the system computer. The Protocol captures information such as the dates and the times the APS machine doors were opened, whether the power supply to the machines was turned off, when the power was turned back on and when the APS machine was closed. The Protocol data has a life span of 3 months in the system after which the data is erased. The cash Book report is a printout from the system computer stating the date, time and the amount of money is in the two APS machines at the time of opening.

10 From the attendance record (P10) adduced in evidence it was established that on 24 January 2002 Waty was off duty. The accused was working with her supervisor William Yap. On 25 January 2002, the accused was off duty that day. Waty and William Yap were working. Waty worked the accused’s shift from 7.00am to 7.00pm. From 26 January 2002 to 28 January 2002 both Waty and the accused were working together. On 29 January 2002 and 30 January 2002, Waty did not report for work. From 31 January 2002 till 2 February 2002, the accused was on leave.

11 Waty, testified that when she commenced working at Loyang Point Shopping Centre car park, she had financial problems at home. Her parents are divorced. Her father defaulted in his maintenance payments. Her mother was unemployed. The family did not have a steady income. The family had an outstanding utility bills of more than $500. She stated that a final reminder was received informing that utilities would be disconnected if the bill was not paid. As Waty had just started working, she had no money to give her mother to settle the bill. She said that the accused was aware of her financial situation as she had mentioned this several times to the accused whilst working together. In response, the accused informed her that she could request Jacin Security on the 15^th for a loan of $50 to $100. She took the accused’s advice and on 15 January 2002, obtained a loan of $100 from the company. As the loan was insufficient to repay the whole bill she retained $50 for her own expenses and put aside the remaining sum. As Waty worked the later shift from 10.30am to 10.30pm, Waty stated that the accused who worked the earlier shift would put on the car parks’ system computer, remove the previous days’ collections from the two APS machines, count and change the coins into currency notes to facilitate easier banking. The accused had also to itemize, reconcile the monies collected with the “Z” reports generated by the system computer and explain the shortages in the collections, if any. Thereafter, the accused had to fill in the Daily Report supported by the “Z” reports from the APS machines, Protocol, Cash Book reports, Shift reports, deposit slips and bank in the monies into Metro Parking’s bank account. As Waty said she wanted to learn how to fill in the Daily Report, the accused allowed her to do so. The accused gave her the amounts and the itemised amounts to be stated in the Daily Report on a rough piece of paper. Waty testified that she copied all the information the accused provided to her onto the Daily reports and thereafter, signed and submitted them to Noordin. Waty stated that when there were power failures at the car park, payments for...