Sheng Siong case: Accused considered kidnapping tycoon Peter Lim’s children
Yahoo file photo of Supreme Court
A few years before allegedly kidnapping the mother of Sheng Siong supermarket boss Lim Hock Chee, sales executive Lee Sze Yong was hatching a plan to abduct the children of billionaire Peter Lim for ransom.
This was revealed in police statements read out by Deputy Public Prosecutor David Khoo in the High Court on Wednesday (31 August), the second day of the Sheng Siong kidnapping trial. Lee, a 44-year-old Singaporean, faces one charge of kidnapping Ng Lye Poh on 8 January 2014 and if convicted, he may be sentenced to life imprisonment and caning, or the death penalty.
As Lee was mired in financial trouble, he said he became desperate and thought of ways to clear his debts. The spark for his kidnapping plan came when Lee read about the local tycoons listed in the Forbes List of Singapore’s richest persons.
Lee decided to target Peter Lim’s children and he researched about Lim on the internet. Knowing that Lim was divorced, he assumed that Lim’s children were staying with the tycoon’s ex-wife.
Lee then checked on the website of Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) and bought information about Lim’s ex-wife with the intention of doing surveillance of her residence. He even had a ransom sum in mind, which he saved in a mobile phone: $50 million.
But Lim’s children were not the only kidnap targets that Lee considered. He researched on at least 10 other rich people including Lim Kok Thay, Genting Group chairman; Koh Wee Meng, the owner of the Fragrance Hotel chain; “popiah king” Sam Goi, Tee Yih Jia Group chairman; and George Quek, BreadTalk Group founder.
Eventually, Lee did not make any concrete plans to kidnap the tycoons or their children.
Lee’s big spending plans after kidnapping
Even as he was researching on the tycoons, Lee was already thinking about living a lavish lifestyle if he were successful in carrying out his kidnapping plan. According to court documents submitted by the prosecutors, Lee had written in separate notes about his spending plans based on $10 million and $20 million ransom sums.
Among the luxury items that Lee was considering included a multi-million dollar house, Ferrari and BMW cars and high-end furniture. But he was also planning to spend the ransom sum on business investments and to pay off his debts.
DPP Khoo revealed that Lee was struggling to pay for placing his late father in a private nursing home. Lee resorted to using credit facilities such as credit cards and bank overdrafts. But he ended up racking up huge debts, and owed over $150,000 to several banks including DBS, HSBC, Maybank and Standard Chartered.
Compounding his financial woes, Lee also borrowed tens of thousands of dollars from a friend, and thousands of dollars from moneylenders.
Despite his predicament, Lee still asked the same friend to lend him money in order to pay a loan deposit for a Volkswagen car costing about $110,000.
Items bought for kidnapping
In preparation to carry out his kidnapping plan, Lee bought several items with the intention of disguising himself, including a Halloween facemask and a skin-colour face mask. He even bought a female Malay dress and headgear from a pasar malam bazaar.
The other items that he bought included duct tapes, ropes, surgical masks and chilli powder.
The trial will resume on Thursday (1 September).
