Jail for Wildlife Reserves Singapore ex-manager who was bribed to 'close one eye' in price-fixing scheme

SINGAPORE: A former manager of Wildlife Reserves Singapore (WRS) who received more than S$51,000 in bribes was jailed for nine months on Wednesday (Mar 30).

Chin Fong Yi, 44, accepted the bribes in exchange for her silence on a price-fixing scheme that had allegedly been running since 2005.

The cases of the other individuals involved in the price-fixing, including a former director at the Singapore Zoo, which is a subsidiary of WRS, are still pending.

Chin used a portion of the bribes she received to buy luxury bags, jewellery and shoes. These were seized during investigations and sold for proceeds amounting to S$9,275, which were paid to the Accountant-General.

The judge also ordered Chin to pay a penalty of S$42,475, which was the balance left over after subtracting the proceeds of the sale from the total amount of bribes that she received.

The Singaporean had earlier pleaded guilty to 12 charges of corruptly obtaining bribes and using criminal proceeds to buy items, with another 67 charges taken into consideration.

District Judge Melissa Tan handed down the sentence sought by the prosecution, after considering the significant amount of bribes involved and Chin's repeated offending over a five-year period from 2010 to 2015.

Defence lawyer Chung Ting Fai had concurred with the prosecution on the jail sentence, but asked for a slightly lower penalty order.

He said his client had provided her full cooperation to the authorities, surrendering all the luxury items she had that were related to the crimes, and pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity.

THE PRICE-FIXING ARRANGEMENT

The court previously heard that Chin was a WRS employee from May 2008 to February 2017. She started in the maintenance department, progressed to estate management in 2010 and became a facilities manager in 2015.

Her duties across the roles included project coordination, upgrading works, drafting job specifications and sourcing quotes from contractors.

The company linked to Chin's case is Shin Yong Construction, a construction firm overseeing civil engineering projects and a long-time contractor of WRS.

Since 2005, Barry Chong Peng Wee, then a director of facilities management at the Singapore Zoo, had maintained an arrangement with key staff members of Shin Yong Construction.

Shin Yong Construction and linked contractors would collude to bid for WRS projects and pay "commissions" to Chong, 54, when they were awarded the projects, according to the prosecution.

As part of this arrangement, Chong would send job specifications to Shin Yong Construction foreman Too Say Kiong, 56. Too would get his group of contractors to put in quotes and present the collated quotes to Chong and his managers. The project would usually be awarded to the vendor with the lowest quote.

"CLOSE ONE EYE"

Sometime in 2010 or 2011, Chin noticed that the prices on the quotations submitted by Shin Yong Construction and its group of contractors were very close to one another.

She suspected that the contractors were engaging in price-fixing with Chong in exchange for some form of financial benefit. She met Too and asked him if there was such an arrangement.

Too told her to "keep quiet and close one eye" and offered her a stack of S$50 notes, which Chin understood to be a reward for her silence on the arrangement.

Initially, Chin rejected the money and left. But Too met her on another occasion and offered her another stack of S$50 notes.

Chin asked Too what the money was for, and Too told her that her boss Chong was taking money. He asked her why she did not wish to take money as well.

Chin then asked Too if the contractors had fixed the prices of the quotations among themselves, and he confirmed this.

After hearing that Chong was receiving money from Too, Chin accepted the bribe. She was aware that it was a reward for her silence on the fact that Shin Yong Construction was giving corrupt bribes to Chong.

Too then settled into an arrangement with Chin to give her monthly bribes for her silence. He typically passed her the money in an envelope at the water treatment plant at the zoo.

Chin received S$500 in bribes every month from April 2010 to April 2015. In May 2015, she was given S$20,000.

She also received a black Chanel wallet worth S$1,250 after telling Too's relative that she liked the wallet very much. On 16 occasions, she used the bribes she received to buy other luxury items.