City Harvest church founder Kong Hee and 4 others arrested
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CITY HARVEST CHURCH LEADERS' TRIAL
ABOUT THE CASE
City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee and five deputies are on trial for allegedly misusing more than $50 million of church funds in sham bond investments. This includes $24 million to fund Kong's pop singer-wife Sun Ho's music career and another $26.6 million to cover up the first amount.
The six face varying charges for criminal breach of trust (CBT) and/or falsifying accounts.
Those found guilty of committing CBT can be jailed for life, or a maximum of 20 years and fined.
Those guilty of falsifying accounts can be jailed up to 10 years and/or fined.
Will CHC 6 have case to answer?
Managing to hide sham transactions
well doesn't mean they didn't do
wrong, says prosecutionReports by KOH HUI THENG
Defence lawyers and the prosecution team wrapped up their submissions yesterday.
Come May 5, Chief District Judge See Kee Oon will decide if the defence has a case to answer.
It was always going to be a complicated case with terms like round-tripping and sham bonds thrown up in court.
And with countless e-mails and reams of documents pulled up as evidence, the prosecution had to piece together a picture of sophisticated criminal intent.
But that attempt to piece together the evidence prompted defence lawyer Kenneth Tan (representing board member John Lam) to earlier say that the evidence cited was so disparate that the judge "has been asked to draw dots or to colour places which are gaps".
In the prosecution's submissions yesterday, Chief Prosecutor Mavis Chionh connected the dots in an attempt to show that church leaders had committed wrongdoing.
1 FEW KNEW
There were a number of contradictions about the relationship between Xtron, pop singer Sun Ho's former management company, and City Harvest Church (CHC).
Xtron had issued the bond investments. But email exchanges showed CHC founder Kong Hee, his No. 2 Tan Ye Peng, investment manager Chew Eng Ran and former finance manager Serina Wee - people with no official positions in Xtron - were
"deciding what is going to happen to the bond proceeds and how the money is going to be used", Ms Chionh said.Only a limited circle knew about the bond details, Indonesian tycoon Wahju Hanafi's guarantee and its counter-guarantee. The board was also kept in the dark about a secret letter, drafted to assure Mr Hanafi's father-in-law.
"The totality of the evidence taken together" was enough to call for the defence to answer the sham bond charges, Ms Chionh said.
2 ROUND-TRIPPING
Tan Ye Peng had instructed finance manager Sharon Tan, Chew and Wee to work out an early version of the roundtripping scheme, Ms Chionh said.
The information was captured on a white board.
An e-mail exchange showed Sharon Tan telling Chew and Wee "that they have been given one week to do so", Ms Chionh said.
The accused had also fed auditors "a pack of lies" about the transactions, she added.
For example, auditor Sim Guan Seng was told in a 2009 meeting with church representatives that the Special Opportunities Fund (SOF) was a legitimate investment even though the money was not invested in anything.
Mr Sim said in his testimony that board member John Lam "couldn't tell him" what the SOF actually was when asked.
3 AVOIDED AUDITOR
The defence's stand that what mattered in this case was the auditors' knowledge of the accounts - rather than what was concealed - is startling, Ms Chionh said.
The accused had approached audit firm director Foong Daw Ching for off-the-record meetings when "there was absolutely no reason" to.
They could have voiced their concerns with the actual auditor, Mr Sim, who was working with them.
"Instead (they sneaked) around his back to consult Mr Foong," Ms Chionh said.
Such concealment confirmed that the real purpose of the consultations "was to facilitate ... entering into sham transactions and then covering it up".
The only inference to be drawn was that the accused wanted to avoid any investigations "that could lead to the unravelling of their shams".
She added: "This is like the fraudster who manages to hide his own crimes, then trying to rely on his success in hiding that crime to exonerate himself."
Defence: Knowledge of wrong use is not dishonesty
Former finance manager Serina Wee had no case to answer when it came to dishonesty, said her lawyer Andre Maniam, as "church money was used for church purposes".
Having knowledge of wrong use does not equate to dishonesty.
Honesty or dishonesty depends on the "state of mind", he added. And the accused had the church's benefits at heart.
Wee (right) also had no intention of defrauding auditors, Mr Maniam said, citing various examples. For Instance, information about the church having a close relationship with Xtron, the company that used to manage pop singer Sun Ho, was made known.
Bond proceeds meant for the Crossover Project - the mission to use pop music to evangelise - were used for the project in question.
Added Mr Maniam: "There was no hiding of the true purpose of the bonds, (which) was always made plain to the auditors."
Hence, he argued, the evidence the prosecution presented could not support allegations of "sham" transactions or there being wrongful loss to the church. Wee was simply acting to further the church's objectives, he said.
News, The New Paper, Thursday, April 10 2014, Pg 18
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Professional scammers
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This year is year of the horse may be horsey wife and greedy Con Hee will get away with the crime. God most of the times chooses to bless villians, notorious ones evil ones ..........
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never mind they get away....their offspring become a 败家å�, spend away all their fortune better :lol:
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hanor hanor :lol:
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They back to court again in may
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Court? Buy furniture? :lol:
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City Harvest leaders have a case to answer: judge
By Jeanette Tan | Yahoo Newsroom – 11 hours ago
The six accused persons in the City Harvest funds misappropriation trial are willing to take the stand to testify in theirdefence when it resumes in July after the judge ruled there was a case they needed to respond to.
In his decision, Chief District Judge See Kee Oon said on Monday that the prosecution has provided sufficient evidence for the charges faced by founder Kong Hee, pastor Tan Ye Peng, John Lam, accountants Serina Wee and Sharon Tan, as well as former church leader Chew Eng Han.
The charges include criminal breach of trust and falsification of accounts, among others centering around the alleged misuse of some $24 million of City Harvest Church (CHC) building funds to further Kong’s wife Ho Yeow Sun’s singing career, as well as the alleged use of $26.6 million to conceal the first amount.
Noting that the evidence presented is more documentary than it is oral — in the form of numerous emails — Chief District Judge See said it was sufficient, in his assessment, to support the contention that CHC's money was misappropriated.
"There is evidence that the relevant accused persons all intended that loss should be caused to CHC," he said, referring to the removal of money from the church's building fund and transferring it to Xtron Productions, the entertainment firm backing Ho's career. "Moreover, from the evidence, it would appear that the accused persons knew that they were not legally entitled to do so."
The judge also said that the evidence produced in court thus far "demonstrates that the accused persons withheld some important information from the auditors", as well as from executive members of CHC.
Also, because there is evidence that the accused knew that the building fund could be used for specific purposes only, Chief District Judge See said it can reasonably be inferred that they were dishonest, because they knew they were not legally allowed to use the money the way the did.
He also said that in his view, evidence has been produced to show that the accounts relating to the monies in question were falsely declared. Further, he said the evidence shows that they "had intended all along that money would be 'round-tripped' from and back to CHC, but nonetheless kept the true nature of these transactions from the auditors and CHC's executive members".
Lawyers for all six on Monday expressed their clients’ willingness to take the stand to give evidence when the trial starts again on 14 July. They declined further comment when approached by reporters outside court.
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Originally posted by Mr Milo:
Court?
Buy furniture?
that one is courts la.
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:lol:
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Originally posted by Honeybunz:
that one is courts la.
Disrupting discussion again. Humsuplo.
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Wait their fanatic followers burn down the court when they kanna convicted :lol:
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So every few months, they go back to court?
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the court there got nice food and drinks there? :lol:
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Think they love go court.
Go court means media give attention to horse face. Horse face loves attention
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hanor hanor :lol:
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Not interesting any more.
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I think the whole damn team from CHC wayang wayang to seek attention. Very free.
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Drag them to Hell: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7HKnclsUCU :lol:
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Originally posted by Mr Milo:
the court there got nice food and drinks there?
Never been there.
Got cai png?
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no cai png for you over there, but lots of luncheon meat :lol: i had to sacrifice the milo tin i was in to make it back :lol: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-JsQav5ljA
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