Love cheat took more than S$178,000 from girlfriend and her mother

SINGAPORE — During their two-year relationship, he asked his girlfriend for money 56 times, saying that it was for “work investments”.

In reality, Gary Won Han Kiat was using the cash to fund his gambling habit. She had given him amounts ranging between S$250 and S$20,000.

In total, Won took more than S$178,000 from his then girlfriend, Ms Leong Shi Min, and her mother. Ms Leong was almost 10 years younger than him and working as a receptionist at the time.

On Tuesday (Feb 12), Won, 35, was jailed two years and a month after he was found guilty of 18 counts of cheating. Thirty-eight other similar charges were taken into consideration during sentencing.

Won and Ms Leong, who is now 26, started dating in 2015 after getting acquainted on messaging application WeChat. They were only two days into their relationship when he started asking her for money.

Won, whose occupation is not known, lied to Ms Leong that he was working as a contractor and, as he was facing financial difficulties, asked her for S$4,000 on the pretext of needing capital for work investments.

She gave him the money, but Won used S$3,950 to buy casino chips from Resorts World Sentosa and squandered the loan away.

This pattern continued throughout their relationship, with Ms Leong continuing to dip into her personal savings to give him money, until money ran out in November 2015. She had given him more than S$17,000 by then.

Ms Leong then resorted to asking her mother for help. She then transferred S$15,000 to Won and gave him another S$41,000 after that.

Won took a total of S$104,300 from Ms Leong throughout 2016.

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Jessie Lim noted that Ms Leong’s mother had to cash out her personal insurance policy so that she could give her daughter money for Won.

In 2017, Ms Leong gave only S$650 to Won before they ended their relationship in May and she made a police report six months later.

DPP Lim sought a jail sentence of 27 months for Won, pointing out that his offences took place over an extended period of time.

Investigations revealed that Won would “almost immediately” go to the casino after collecting the money, which showed that he had no intention of using the money for work investments, she added.

“In repeating the same false representation over and over again to the victims, the accused demonstrated a lack of remorse for his actions,” said the DPP.

She added that Won had returned just S$12,710 to Ms Leong to date.

He will start serving his sentence next Monday and is out on a S$20,000 bail.

Won could have been jailed up to 10 years and fined for each cheating charge.