SINGAPORE — A former director of a beauty and wellness training school was today (July 3) sentenced to seven months jail for cheating the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) into subsidising the course fees of fictional employees, following a successful appeal by the Public Prosecutor.

Justice Lee Seiu Kin, who allowed the appeal, said the Government’s Skill Development Fund (SDF) is aimed at improving employees’ skills. However, the accused, Ong Eng Teck, abused the system which “damaged” the purpose of the scheme.

The High Court Judge also said that the 47-year-old’s actions “tied down” resources which could have been “devoted to further benefit the scheme”.

Ong who ran the Integrative Therapy Centre (ITC) - which has since folded - was charged with 46 counts of cheating the WDA into disbursing S$9,000 and attempting to cheat them of $60,480 between May 2007 and June 2008.

He was acquitted in September, 2011 on eight charges proceeded by the prosecution after a District Judge found that there was a lack of evidence to prove his alleged acts of deception.

The District Judge was also “not convinced” that Ong knew that each trainee did not meet the employment and sponsorship requirements to make them eligible to obtain the subsidy.

Deputy Public Prosecutor David Chew argued in the appeal last year that Ong knew that eight of the trainees involved were unemployed and had instructed two other companies to prepare tax forms and also arranged Central Provident Fund contributions to the trainees when they never did any work and were never on their payrolls. The companies also never contributed to any part of the trainee’s course fees.

Last November, Justice Lee found Ong guilty of three charges as the oral evidence given by the trainees during the trial was “overwhelmingly indicative” of Ong’s involvement.

In mitigation, Ong’s lawyer Daniel Chia said that Ong was not involved in a “fly-by-night business” and that ITC was a genuine establishment which has helped “numerous people re-train and obtain jobs”.

Mr Chia, who sought a sentence of seven-and-a-half to eight months, argued that Ong’s mistake was that he “believed” he could get paid through the WDA grant and that he should be viewed as a man who “made a mistake and not a person who “embarked upon a convoluted scheme to cheat a government entity”. Ong today made restitution of S$9,000 to the WDA, the court heard.