ICA officer charged with receiving sex, bribes from foreign women
SINGAPORE — An Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) officer was charged on Tuesday (24 November) with obtaining money and sex from two female Chinese nationals in exchange for arranging for them to be issued with a Special Pass.
Checkpoints inspector Teo Hwee Peng, 47, faces 12 charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act. The two female Chinese nationals, Liang Qinglan, 37, and Cheng Wenjuan, 32, were also charged for bribing him.
Nine of these relate to Liang. Teo, a Singaporean, is said to have attempted to obtain an Apple iPhone X, sex and a red packet containing RMB188.88 (S$38.57) from Liang in return for arranging for Liang to be issued with a Special Pass so that she could remain in Singapore, between 2018 and last year.
On another occasion, he obtained cash of at least $2,100, loans amounting to about RMB7,000 and sex from Liang as rewards for making the arrangements for her.
The remaining three charges involve alleged offences with Cheng last year. Teo purportedly attempted to obtain some $1,500 from Cheng. He received a free massage and masturbation service from Cheng as inducement to arrange for her to have a Special Pass so that she could remain in Singapore.
He also corruptly agreed to accept an unspecified amount of money from Cheng in the future as a reward for the arrangements.
Correspondingly, Liang and Cheng were charged with nine and four charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act for their acts of bribery towards Teo.
Cheng faces additional charges for corruptly offering about $500 to Teo, which he allegedly rejected. On 26 July 2019, she also offered an unspecified sum of money to Teo in return for him providing her with information on the arrest status of a person known as Hu Youai.
Mistakenly bribed another man
Separately, Cheng also faces charges for similar offences involving Singaporean Kelvin Lim Chee Wee, 42, who had supposedly lied that he used to work at ICA, and had friends in the immigration department who could help her with a Special Pass. In fact, Lim was a manager of a motor vehicle workshop and had never worked in ICA.
Nevertheless Cheng allegedly fell for the sham. She was handed 12 charges for offering Lim bribes.
Between May and July 2019, she supposedly gave Lim bribes in the form of free sex on eight occasions, $7,000, and RMB1,000 as inducements to arrange for a purported ICA officer to help her remain in Singapore by arranging for her to be issued with a Special Pass.
In July last year, she allegedly gave Lim some $2,000 and RMB3,000 for a purported ICA officer to help another person – known as Lei Guoxiang – remain in Singapore by arranging for Lei to be issued with a Special Pass.
Likewise, Lim faces 14 charges for receiving bribes from Cheng.
Teo, Cheng and Liang indicated that they wanted to claim trial while Lim said he wanted to engage counsel. They will all return to court on 17 December.
In response to queries fromYahoo News Singapore, ICA said that it “takes a zero tolerance stance on corrupt officers”.
“All ICA officers are expected to maintain a high standard of integrity at all times. Officers who break the law will be severely dealt with accordingly. In addition, appropriate disciplinary action would be taken against the officer, in accordance with the civil service disciplinary framework.”
It declined to comment further as the case was before the court.
If convicted of a corruption offence, any of the four accused can be jailed up to five years and/or fined up to $100,000.
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