SINGAPORE — Less than a year after a video went viral of a tourist begging for a refund exposed their unscrupulous sales tactics, four ex-salesmen of a now-defunct Sim Lim Square electronics shop were sentenced to between four and 14 months’ jail today (Oct 14).

District judge Toh Yung Cheong slammed the thuggish behaviour of Koh Guan Seng, 38, Kam Kok Keong, 31, Lim Hong Ching, 34, and Lim Zhi Wei Kelvin, 32, and sentenced them to 14, 11, six and four months’ jail, respectively.

While their boss, Jover Chew Chiew Loon, was the mastermind of the criminal enterprise, the judge said the four of them “made the conscious decisions to commit the offences”, and so must bear personal responsibility for their conduct.

Together with Chew, who has since folded the business, Mobile Air, and whose case before the court is pending, the four men collectively cheated customers of about S$16,149 through dirty sales tactics. These include them quoting attractive prices and then altering the invoices after deals had been inked, so as to inflate the amount customers have to pay.

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The judge also chided them for abusing legitimate documents, such as warranty agreements, to mask their acts under a “veneer of legitimacy” so that if the police were called in, the cases would be classified as contractual disputes rather than criminal cases.

Most of their victims were low-wage foreign workers with a poor command of English and a limited understanding of the avenues of seeking recourse, the court heard.

“The main purpose of quoting their victims an attractive price was to induce them to hand over their hard-earned money and to thereafter use various means to try to extract more money from them. These are the elements that comprise the offence of cheating,” the judge said.

He agreed with the prosecution, comprising deputy public prosecutors Eunice Lim, Charis Low and Victoria Ting, that the four men targeted vulnerable victims and caused potential harm to Singapore’s reputation as a tourist and shopping destination.

Koh and Kam were singled out by the judge as the most culpable of the lot, for how they “did not waver” in their commitment to the scam even after the police and the Consumer’s Association of Singapore (CASE) got involved. In fact, both had taunted their victims to lodge complaints, the court heard.

Koh was also served with orders from the Small Claims Tribunal to refund money to two of his victims but did not comply.

Today, DPP Lim asked the court to hand down a stiff sentence to “show disapproval to like-minded offenders”. “The scam in Mobile Air is nothing short of devious,” she said. The four men showed little remorse by “pushing the blame to (the) authorities for not stopping them”, she added.

The four sentenced today faced between one and 15 counts of abetment by conspiracy to cheat and dishonestly inducing delivery of property, which carries the maximum penalty of 10 years’ jail and a fine.

Chew faces 28 charges involving S$16,049. His case will be heard on Oct 28. Today, the prosecution told the court that Chew has made full restitution for his cases.