Nurse who took 65 patients' details from clinic database to help boyfriend abuse cough syrup gets jail

SINGAPORE — By logging into a clinic’s patient information system without authorisation, a nurse obtained the names and National Registration Identity Card (NRIC) numbers of at least 65 inactive patients to aid her boyfriend in abusing cough syrup.

Tan Tong Lin, 42, pleaded guilty to two charges under the Computer Misuse Act and one cheating charge on Monday (June 3). She was sentenced to five months’ jail.

The court heard that Tan was a nurse at M/S Helen Tan Clinic, which sold cough syrup over the counter without consultations, as long as patients gave their names and identity card numbers. 

The clinic also had a rule that only 240ml of cough syrup could be sold to any given patient over a period of nine days.

To circumvent this rule and hide the fact that he was abusing cough syrup, Tan’s boyfriend Ng Kai Loon sought her help to buy cough syrup from the clinic under other patients’ names around May 1, 2021.

After agreeing to his request, Tan logged into the clinic’s patient information system and got a list of inactive patients’ details, whose patient statuses had been deactivated because they had not returned to the clinic for some time. 

Obtaining the names and NRIC numbers of at least 65 patients without her employer’s authority, Tan shared this list of patients with her boyfriend. 

She also reactivated patients’ statuses on at least 25 occasions between May 2021 and December 2021 to allow Ng to buy cough syrup under these patients’ names. 

During the same period, her boyfriend bought cough syrup from the clinic while Tan was on duty, supposedly on behalf of the patients whose personal information he provided, though Tan knew Ng was buying it for his own consumption. 

Tan sold cough syrup on at least 25 occasions and recorded these transactions under the personal details of the patients that Ng provided. 

Her offences were discovered only a few months later in February 2022, when a patient complained that the clinic had allowed others to collect medication under her identity. 

The clinic hired a private investigator for S$12,000 to uncover the offences. 

In mitigation, the nurse’s lawyer, Mr Kalaithasan Karuppaya from law firm Regent Law LLC, urged the court to exercise leniency in sentencing. 

He said that Tan “sincerely regrets” her actions and understood the seriousness of her offences, and said that she would not be back in court as an offender.

Tan had been convicted before of theft offences and the possession of drugs and drug utensils, the court heard.

In sentencing, District Judge Terence Tay said that Tan had abused her position as a nurse in a clinic to fuel her boyfriend’s substance abuse over a “long period of time”. 

Although he noted that Tan had pleaded guilty at an early stage, he added that NRIC numbers are “sensitive information” that can lead to “dire consequences” such as identity theft.

Tan's breach of the clinic’s system could also have led to inaccurate record keeping, the judge added. 

Anyone convicted of cheating can be jailed for up to 10 years and be fined. 

Those who commit an unauthorised modification of computer material can be jailed for up to three years or fined up to S$10,000, or both, on a first offence. In the case of a second offence and conviction, a person can be jailed for up to five years or fined up to S$20,000, or face both punishments.

For committing unauthorised access to the clinic's patient information system, Tan could have been jailed up to two years or fined up to S$5,000, or both. In the case of a second or subsequent conviction, an offender could be jailed for up to three years or be fined up to S$10,000, or both.