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A MAN was jailed a total of two years on Monday for helping fugitive lawyer David Rasif hide 28 gold bars and engaging with another to sell five gold bars.
Bernard Ong Ee Beng, 46, a bankrupt, pleaded guilty last Thursday to concealing the 28 gold bars to help the runaway lawyer from being prosecuted in June last year.
He also admitted to conspiring with a friend, Lye Thiam Hock, 52, to sell five gold bars between June 26 and July last year. Lye, who has since been charged and his case is pending, sold the five bars to one Liu Yuk Ming.
A district court heard that Rasif, who is at large, paid $1.65 million to United Overseas Bank to buy 47 gold bars, each weighing 1 kg, on June 1 last year.
That afternoon Rasif contacted Ong and met him at a carpark in Toa Payoh where he handed him a briefcase containing the gold bars for safe-keeping.
Ong took them home.
Days later, when he found out from newspaper reports that Rasif had absconded with a large sum of his client's money, he moved the gold bars to his brother's flat in Kim Keat Avenue on June 6 as he did not want the police to look for him.
On top of the 28 gold bars, Ong also hid the remaining 19 bars at Lye's flat in Tampines.
Ong travelled to Thailand in June and July last year. By then, he had strong reasons to believe that the gold bars handed to him by Rasif were stolen property.
While in Thailand, he needed capital to start a business there. He asked Lye to help him sell two of the gold bars for $31,000. Ong received $15,500 from the sale.
Subsequently, when he needed more money, he sold another five gold bars, with Lye's help, to Liu Yuk Ming for $135,000.
Both Ong and Lye were arrested on July 31 last year.
The 28 gold bars, and another 12 were recovered from Lye's flat.
About 2kg of loose pieces of gold were eventually recovered together with a further sum of $174,500.
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