Man involved in eight-man gang robbery jailed 7 years
Reuters file photo
SINGAPORE — For two months, the gang of eight meticulously schemed to rob the manager of a money-changer, planning to strike after a courier delivered foreign and local currencies from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore.
The men — all Malaysians apart from one Singapore permanent resident — made multiple trips to Singapore to conduct surveillance of Mr Ali Yousof Saiboo’s travel route, recce the area for the intended robbery and even made plans to conceal their identities with balaclavas, facemasks and plasters stuck on their fingertips to prevent leaving behind prints.
Their best-laid plans came to nought when three of them were arrested by the police days after the incident on Nov 5, 2014. The other five are still on the run.
One of them, Ravi Sandhira Sagaran, 28, was yesterday sentenced to seven years’ jail and given 12 strokes of the cane for jointly committing the gang robbery of some S$624,000 in foreign and local currencies. The money has not been recovered.
Two of his alleged accomplices, Tachana Moorthy Peromal, 29, and Annadurai Raman, 43, intend to claim trial.
The district court heard yesterday that prior to September 2014, Tachana and other accomplices planned to commit the robbery in Singapore after learning about the transportation of currencies by the company’s couriers.
In September and October, they — besides Annadurai who resided in Singapore — came to Singapore on several occasions, supposedly to conduct surveillance on the victim’s travel route after he collects the bags of currencies from Changi Airport.
Ravi and his accomplices also allegedly conducted a recce of Geylang East Central, where Mr Ali, 35, stayed, to familarise themselves with the intended location of the robbery.
The plan was to have Annadurai look out for the victim’s car along Bedok Reservoir Road while five of them, including Ravi, would carry out the robbery, the court heard. Another two will be in a separate vehicle nearby to coordinate and give instructions.
There were four occasions in October where they wanted to execute their planned robbery but eventually aborted their plans.
On the night of Nov 4, Ravi and four others drove to Geylang East to wait for the victim. They were armed with a crowbar, balaclavas and facemasks to conceal their faces and also stuck plasters on all of their fingertips to avoid leaving any fingerprints at the crime scene.
Even after the victim changed his mind about where he wanted to safe-keep the currencies, the group tailed him to his father-in-law’s place in Aljunied Crescent.
Once the car was parked, the gang moved in, using the crowbar to shatter the car window and threatened to kill the victim’s two-year-old son, who was in the vehicle.
The victim was dragged out of his car and punched once on his body. The others retrieved the two bags of currencies and kicked the victim in his stomach before driving off. Thereafter, seven of them left Singapore for Malaysia within a few minutes of each other.
The police arrested Annadurai on Nov 8, and Ravi and Tachana four days later.
Urging the court to impose a jail term of between seven to nine years and with caning, Deputy Public Prosecutor Tan Soo Tet said there was an extremely high level of detailed planning and premeditation involved in the offence, including the “extensive and meticulous” surveillance and recceing conducted by them.
The offence was also organised, right down to how each of the accomplices “performed defined and complementary tasks and roles” in the lead up to and execution of the robbery, said Mr Tan.
In mitigation, Ravi’s lawyer Sunil Sudheesan argued that his client played a minor role in the robbery where he did not know what the crowbar would be used for and he had not used violence on the victim.
For gang robbery, Ravi could have been jailed between five and 20 years and caned at least 12 times.
