Recalcitrant cigarette smuggler gets 40 months’ jail, S$8.7m fine

SINGAPORE — A logistics company director was sentenced to 40 months’ jail and a whopping S$8.7 million fine on Monday (Jan 15) for dealing in contraband cigarettes again, despite having been jailed previously for the same offence.

The sentence handed down by the State Courts to Iskandar Abu Bakar, 44, for dealing in duty-unpaid cigarettes is the highest since 2014 — on Oct 3, 2014, another offender was sentenced to three years and six months’ jail and fined S$14 million, said a Singapore Customs spokesman.

Iskandar flew in 3,050 cartons of duty-unpaid cigarettes from Jakarta, Indonesia, masking them as a shipment of machinery parts and accessories. His plan was to surreptitiously move the contraband out of Changi Airfreight Centre in small packages using his car, but he was foiled during a sting operation by Singapore Customs officers on July 6 last year.

Photo: Singapore Customs

After uncovering the contraband, Customs officers searched Iskandar’s car and found local and foreign currencies amounting to more than S$120,000, and an additional one carton and 25 packets of duty-unpaid cigarettes.

The duty-unpaid cigarettes seized, as well as the total duty and Goods and Services Tax (GST) evaded, amounted to about S$287,330 and S$21,000 respectively.

The cash seized has been handed over to the Commercial Affairs Department, which is conducting further investigations on unspecified offences, a press release from Customs on Wednesday (Jan 17) stated.

Singapore Customs officers conducted a follow-up search of Iskandar’s car and found local and foreign currencies of over S$120,000. Photo: Singapore Customs

Iskandar had enlisted the help of Hashbullah Taufiq Mohd Amin to retrieve the two crates of contraband cigarettes. The latter was supposed to pack them into smaller batches for Iskandar to get out of the air freight centre. He was sentenced to 30 months’ jail in July last year for his role in the offence.

Iskandar committed a similar offence a decade ago, and was sentenced to 12 months’ jail for dealing with 500 cartons of duty-unpaid cigarettes.

Repeat offenders are liable to enhanced punishments under the Customs Act, including a mandatory jail term of up to six years and a heavier fine of no less than 30 times the duty or GST evaded.

Iskandar faces 20 months’ imprisonment in default of the fine.