Prison workshop supervisor, 4 inmates charged with smuggling sedatives into jail

SINGAPORE — A supervisor in a prison workshop was charged on Friday (Nov 18) after he smuggled sedatives into jail for inmates. 

Calvin Ang Wei Sheng, 39, who was a workshop supervisor at New Hope Food Industries at the time of the offence, faces five charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act. 

Four inmates who were involved in the scheme were also charged on the same day. 

Ismail Musun Mollah, 56, faces two charges under the same Act, while Irees Rahman, 49, Sidek Jamaludin, 42, and Muhammad Shaifullah Ab Latif, 36, face one charge each.

The five will return to court on Jan 12.

Ang remains out on a S$5,000 bail while the four inmates are in remand. 

The Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) said in a statement on Friday that Ang allegedly received a total of S$1,200 on five occasions from the four inmates. 

This was in return for helping them buy and smuggle Epam pills — a medicine with sedative effects used to treat insomnia and sleeping disorders — into Changi Prison. 

The Singapore Prison Service (SPS) said in a statement on Friday that it received information in early October last year that Ang had smuggled Epam pills onto prison premises. 

After conducting internal investigations, it filed a police report.

Ang was barred from entering the prison and the inmates involved were isolated from other inmates.

During a search of the workshop, inmates’ cells and common areas, some of the pills were found.

The case was then referred to the CPIB for further investigations. 

SPS said that it has in place security measures to screen all personnel and goods entering prison premises. These include walk-through and handheld metal detectors, and random frisk searches.

"SPS adopts a zero-tolerance approach towards the smuggling of items into prison premises. All such cases will be investigated, and all persons, including vendors and inmates, if found guilty, will be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law," it added.

Any person convicted of a corruption offence can be fined up to S$100,000 or be jailed for up to five years, or both.