Accountant jailed for major fraud - Ewe Pang Kooi case

In 2019, Ewe Pang Kooi, a chartered accountant in Singapore, was jailed for about 25 years for criminal breach of trust. The main charges related to his work as a liquidator of several companies. His duty was to collect the assets and pay the company debts. Any surplus would belong to shareholders. Instead, he stole over $40 million. Some might think that this means he has so much money in the bank. However, he was a hardcore gambler, gambling hundreds of thousands of dollars in the local casinos. At first he stole a few million. But later, to cover up the theft, he stole from another client to replace the first loss. This procedure was repeated many times.

The court in following the City Harvest Church case reasoning, held that Ewe was guilty of the more serious form of criminal breach of trust (CBT). This was because he was acting in his professional capacity when he committed the crimes. On the other hand, the 6 City Harvest Church leaders were not acting as professionals when they were directors in charge of the church building fund money. As a result, they were guilty only of the basic offence of CBT and not the more serious form.

Ewe, is about 65 years old. With a 25 year jail term, he will be about 90 years old when he is released. However, with good behaviour, nearly all prisoners can get a 1/3 discount on their jail sentence. This is called remission.

This is the 2nd major fraud case carried out by an accountant, after the Chia Teck Leng case.