SINGAPORE — A delivery driver for a wholesale meat distributor stole meat products worth more than S$170,000 from his employer.

He then sold the stolen meat to a customer and pocketed the sales proceeds for himself and another colleague.

On Monday (May 20), Sivam Karuppan, 42, was sentenced to 30 months' jail for committing theft while being employed as a staff member.

He pleaded guilty to a charge for theft as a servant.

A case against his colleague is yet to go to court.

WHAT HAPPENED

At the time of the offence, Sivam was working as a delivery driver for wholesale meat distributor Chee Song Foods.

Sivam's co-accused is 27-year-old Neshan Gunasundram, who was employed by the company as a warehouse supervisor.

Neshan's role was to supervise the flow of goods in and out of the warehouse, including instructing other workers on the correct quantity of meat products for loading and delivery to customers.

Around May 2021, Sivam made small talk with a staff member of one of the company’s customers, GV Meat Distributor.

The man then asked if Sivam had extra meat to be sold at a cheaper price. He offered to pay Sivam directly to buy such meat.

Sivam later told Neshan about the customer.

They then allegedly conspired to steal meat products from the company, directly sell the stolen meat to the customer and split the proceeds between them.

The court heard that on 34 occasions between Jan 4 and July 15 in 2022, Sivam had liaised with the customer, who would tell Sivam the amount of meat that he needed.

Sivam relayed this information to Neshan.

Whenever the customer placed an order with the company, Neshan allegedly instructed other workers to load onto Sivam’s delivery truck the quantities ordered, together with the extra meat products ordered directly through Sivam.

When delivering the stolen meat to the customer, Sivam would also pocket the money received for himself and later allegedly split it with Neshan.

Court documents showed that Sivam and Neshan allegedly stole meat products worth S$170,059.77 in total.

On July 23, 2022, the company’s operations and logistics manager Eddie Loh lodged a police report against them after conducting internal investigations.

Mr Loh had been notified of rumours that meat products had been stolen from the company’s warehouse, because there were irregularities between the quantity of products ordered by customers and the actual quantity loaded for delivery.

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Ronnie Ang sought a jail sentence of 32 to 38 months for Sivam's offences, saying that he had "abused the trust of his employer".

DPP Ang added that the amount of meat products was significant and that the offence had taken place for an extended period of time.

Defence counsel Foo Ho Chew of HC Law Practice said that Sivam has been living in hardship, sleeping at bus stops and void decks.

For committing theft as a servant, Sivam could have been jailed for up to seven years and fined.