SINGAPORE, Oct 23 — An hour after returning to the country he had left six years ago, lawyer Tan Cheng Yew was taken to the Subordinate Courts in Singapore and charged with fraud.
Six charges of cheating and criminal breach of trust involving some S$5.75 million (RM13.8 million) were read out to him. Tan, 41, was extradited on a flight from Munich, where he was arrested and held earlier this year.
He is alleged to have committed the offences between March 2001 and January 2003 before fleeing the following month.
In two of the charges, Tan is said to have used S$2.33 million belonging to two clients while he was their lawyer.
He is alleged to have pledged another S$900,000 as security for a personal bank loan. He is also said to have placed S$1.94 million into his own bank accounts.
The funds had been entrusted to him as an agent for investments to be made in Australia.
He faces two other charges of cheating involving some S$580,000.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Mark Jayaratnam successfully applied for Tan to be remanded for further investigations at the Central Police Division. District Judge John Ng ordered the case to be brought up next week for further mention.
Tan looked calm and collected, but his eyes grew wet and his face twitched as his father, who had shown up for the hearing, approached the dock to speak to him at the end of the session.
Senior Counsel Michael Khoo, who is defending Tan, said his client was coping well.
Before Tan disappeared in February 2003, he called his law firm, TanJinHwee Eunice and Lim Choo Eng in Cecil Street. He told the firm that he was in Perth but could not return to Singapore as he had lost his passport and cell phone.
Shortly after that, the firm cut him off as a partner.
Tan was known as a skilled lawyer and a top debater. Friends said he had a weakness for casinos where he liked to test his skill and luck.
At the time of his disappearance, he was believed to have been in debt for over a year, owing more than S$1 million to at least two Australian casinos.
His disappearance occurred at a time when a slew of other lawyers had run off with their clients’ funds, which resulted in the tightening of accounting procedures for law firms.
His case was the biggest in terms of the amount involved until it was eclipsed by lawyer David Rasif, who skipped town in June 2006 with S$12 million of his clients’ money. Rasif is still at large.
If convicted of criminal breach of trust, Tan could be sentenced to life imprisonment or jailed for up to 10 years and fined. For the two cheating charges, he could be jailed for up to seven years and fined, if convicted. — The Straits Times
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