WILLIAM Ng Wee Lip, an assistant vice-president at Citibank Singapore, was a compulsive gambler who frequented casinos and also betted heavily on football.
In 1996, he began siphoning off money from internal bank accounts to feed his habit.
For more than seven years, he used the bank’s computer system to transfer nearly S$4.8mil (RM11mil) to his own and other accounts, all with Citibank.
He has not repaid any of the money he swiped from six internal bank accounts between May 1996 and September last year.
Ng, 38, was jailed on Thursday for 11 years and eight months after he pleaded guilty to 11 charges under the Computer Misuse Act.
Another 93 charges were taken into consideration.
He made 104 transfers into his own account, a joint account he held with his wife, his sister’s account, the accounts of two Citibank colleagues and another account.
This was how Ng operated.
His job included authorising transactions entered into a computer system.
To transfer funds from an internal account to the account of a Citibank customer, one officer had to enter the transaction and another had to authorise it.
Ng was an authoriser and could not enter transactions into the system.
But his subordinates could.
So he got them to give him their passwords, on the pretext of helping them with their work after office hours.
In this way, Ng transferred about S$220,000 (RM490,000) to a colleague who helped him to place soccer bets.
About S$90,000 (RM200,000) which he transferred to the account of his sister, Ng Ai Leng, were also diverted to the colleague, who used the money to repay Ng’s gambling debts.
The bank reported Ng to the Commercial Affairs Department last December.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Hwong Meng Jet told the court although some of the money was transferred to Ai Leng, Ng controlled the account.
Pleading for leniency, Ng’s lawyer, Suresh Damodara, said that while the offences were done through a computer, this was not a case of cyber crime involving hacking.
He said Ng went through a painful divorce in 1994 and began gambling to distract himself but it developed into an addiction.
Gambling in casinos in Australia, Genting and Las Vegas became a regular feature in his client’s life, he said.
Ng, now remarried with three children, was remorseful for what he had done, his lawyer said. – The Straits Times/Asia News Network
In 1996, he began siphoning off money from internal bank accounts to feed his habit.
For more than seven years, he used the bank’s computer system to transfer nearly S$4.8mil (RM11mil) to his own and other accounts, all with Citibank.
He has not repaid any of the money he swiped from six internal bank accounts between May 1996 and September last year.
Ng, 38, was jailed on Thursday for 11 years and eight months after he pleaded guilty to 11 charges under the Computer Misuse Act.
Another 93 charges were taken into consideration.
He made 104 transfers into his own account, a joint account he held with his wife, his sister’s account, the accounts of two Citibank colleagues and another account.
This was how Ng operated.
His job included authorising transactions entered into a computer system.
To transfer funds from an internal account to the account of a Citibank customer, one officer had to enter the transaction and another had to authorise it.
Ng was an authoriser and could not enter transactions into the system.
But his subordinates could.
So he got them to give him their passwords, on the pretext of helping them with their work after office hours.
In this way, Ng transferred about S$220,000 (RM490,000) to a colleague who helped him to place soccer bets.
About S$90,000 (RM200,000) which he transferred to the account of his sister, Ng Ai Leng, were also diverted to the colleague, who used the money to repay Ng’s gambling debts.
The bank reported Ng to the Commercial Affairs Department last December.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Hwong Meng Jet told the court although some of the money was transferred to Ai Leng, Ng controlled the account.
Pleading for leniency, Ng’s lawyer, Suresh Damodara, said that while the offences were done through a computer, this was not a case of cyber crime involving hacking.
He said Ng went through a painful divorce in 1994 and began gambling to distract himself but it developed into an addiction.
Gambling in casinos in Australia, Genting and Las Vegas became a regular feature in his client’s life, he said.
Ng, now remarried with three children, was remorseful for what he had done, his lawyer said. – The Straits Times/Asia News Network
