6 years’ jail for ex-accounting manager who embezzled S$1.7m from shipping firm over 7.5 years

SINGAPORE — A man who pocketed much more than S$1.7 million about about 7.5 years when he was an accounting supervisor at a delivery corporation was jailed for 6 many years on Tuesday (May possibly 17).

Chow Pak Thong, 68, pleaded responsible previously to 4 counts just about every of criminal breach of have faith in and falsification of accounts. Eight equivalent rates have been taken into thought in the course of sentencing on Tuesday.

1 other cost of legal intimidation was also taken into consideration above an incident in which Chow pointed a fruit knife at the company’s director, Mr Wong Ah Khim, when he was confronted above his dishonesty on July 3, 2019 in the firm’s Tanjong Pagar business office. 

The court docket read that Chow experienced been utilized by BSA Transportation given that June 4, 1992 as an accounting manager.

He was liable for making ready the company’s normal and sub-ledgers, payroll as very well as the income-and-loss forecast. 

As element of his responsibilities, he was just one of three workforce who were the authorised signatories for the company’s company account with United Abroad Financial institution (UOB). The other two personnel ended up the company’s directors, Mr Wong and Mr Mark Kwan Kai Hoe.

Chow was authorised to situation dollars cheques to ship captains as cash developments. These income cheques would attract on the balances in the company account.

Deputy General public Prosecutor (DPP) Matthew Choo reported that someday in January 2012, Chow devised a plan to siphon money from the company account.

Chow would ask for cheques that had been pre-signed by 1 of the directors.

He then organized payment vouchers of the firm that reflected the corresponding cheque selection and an volume to be encashed. He also wrote untrue factors in the payment voucher as the reason for the payment, these types of as stating that the income was made use of as partial settlements for maintenance or docking invoices.

Chow accounted for the sums encashed in the company’s ledgers by working with the fictitious payment vouchers that have been established as supporting paperwork.

He encashed the cheques at a UOB branch before preserving the funds for his personal bills.

On July 3, 2019, the two directors confronted Chow after Mr Kwan discovered discrepancies among the company’s statement of accounts and lender statements.

As the confrontation turned heated, Chow wielded a fruit knife at Mr Wong. 

Chow was fired that same day and Mr Kwan designed a law enforcement report the up coming day.

In the 7.5 a long time that Chow carried out his plan, he misappropriated a overall of S$1,742,800.

He has not built any restitution for the funds that he embezzled.

For every single demand of legal breach of trust as a servant, Chow could have been jailed for up to 15 decades and could have been liable for a fantastic.

For every single charge of falsifying accounts, he could have been jailed up to 10 decades or fined, or both of those.