2 men steal S$100,000 from money changer by swopping counterfeit notes with real ones
SINGAPORE — Believing that Singapore is a “rich country”, two foreigners decided to fly from their home country to Singapore in order to steal money from a money changer here.
Akhalaia Irakli, 46, and Malishava Joni, 55, stole US$74,300 (S$99,700) from a money changer by swopping counterfeit United States dollar notes with new ones while exchanging the money.
The pair, who are from the country Georgia located between Western Asia and Eastern Europe, pleaded guilty on Monday (Aug 7) to one charge of theft in dwelling and one charge of failing to declare movement of money out of Singapore.
One other charge of acquiring, possessing or using benefits from criminal conduct will be taken into consideration for sentencing, which is scheduled to be on Sept 27.
WHAT HAPPENED
While Irakli and Joni were in Georgia, Irakli came up with an idea to steal money from a money changer in Singapore.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Dan Pan said that Irakli had decided to target Singapore because he was of the view that Singapore is a rich country.
He had learnt of a theft method that involved pretending to buy US dollars using another currency and asking the money changer to hand over the US dollars for inspection.
Then, the thief would secretly swop the genuine US dollars with counterfeit US dollars, and leave with the real notes.
After hearing about Irakli's plan, Joni agreed to help him.
The duo then flew to Singapore on April 6, carrying a mix of counterfeit US dollar notes and real US dollar notes, as well as counterfeit Euros.
Once in Singapore, they travelled around the island to search for a suitable money changer.
"They were looking for a money changer who would be sufficiently trusting of them so as to hand over the US dollar to them for inspection before they paid for the US dollar, and also a money changer that handled a sufficiently large amount of money," DPP Pan said.
On April 18, they approached the victim — the sole proprietor of a money-changing shop called L1, with the request of buying US$1,500 in exchange for Singapore dollars. Court documents did not state its location or the victim's name.
The victim handed Irakli 15 pieces of US$100 cash notes after Irakli said that he wanted to see the dollar notes before making the exchange.
After counting the money, Irakli took out one US$100 note and placed the remaining 14 pieces in a black clutch bag.
He then handed the victim the bag and asked him to safekeep it.
Irakli also paid him Singapore dollars for the US$100 he took and the two then left.
Irakli returned a short while later to pay the victim Singapore dollars in exchange for the remaining money and collected the black bag.
The next two days, Irakli returned to the shop alone and used this same method.
DPP Pan said that the purpose of these purchases was to gain the trust of the victim and make him comfortable with handing the US dollars to Irakli, letting him put it in the black bag, and then keeping it for safekeeping.
On April 21, Irakli returned to the shop alone after asking an agent to book flight tickets for him and Joni.
Irakli then left his black clutch bag in the shop, saying that he would return to pay for the S$3,200 US dollars he wanted to buy.
He also said that he wanted to purchase US$75,000 later.
At around 4.30pm, the pair went to the shop and the victim handed Irakli 750 pieces of US$100 notes.
Irakli then took out seven US$100 notes and paid for them on the spot.
He then rebundled the remaining US dollar notes into three separate plastic bags and placed them in a black leather briefcase.
However, the pair had already placed three plastic bags containing counterfeit notes into this briefcase.
Irakli then pretended to hand over the black briefcase to the money changer but could not do so because it could not fit through the opening in the glass pane of the counter.
The pair then reopened the briefcase under the pretext of transferring the genuine US dollar notes to the smaller black clutch bag.
They transferred instead the three plastic bags containing the counterfeit notes from the black leather briefcase to the black clutch bag.
After giving the black clutch bag with the counterfeit notes to the victim, they said that they would be back to pay for the US dollars.
They then left with the black briefcase, which contained the genuine US dollar notes.
They were later caught before the plane they boarded took off. Court documents did not state their destination.
The pair did not declare to the immigration authorities that each of them was trying to move out of Singapore with cash exceeding the prescribed amount of S$20,000.
Anyone convicted of theft in dwelling can be jailed up to seven years and fined.
If found guilty of not reporting cross-border movement of cash that exceeds the prescribed amount, a person can be jailed up to three years and fined up to S$50,000.
