CHINESE national Zhang Ruijin, one of the 10 foreign nationals embroiled in Singapore’s largest money laundering case, has been slapped with five new charges, a few days before he is scheduled to plead guilty.
In court on Friday (Apr 26), Zhang was charged with receiving HK$56.9 million (S$9.9 million) in his Standard Chartered Bank Singapore (StanChart) account, which is believed to be, in part or in whole, benefits of criminal conduct.
The amount was transferred in seven deposits between Oct 16 and 29, 2020, the charge sheet alleged.
He had also allegedly forged a document and submitted it to StanChart to support the HK$56.9 million sum.
Other charge sheets noted he had allegedly possessed a total of HK$151.3 million in a CIMB Bank account that was suspected to benefit from criminal conduct. The charges noted he was unable to satisfactorily account for how he came by this amount.
This brings the total number of charges Zhang faces to eight.
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He was previously charged with allegedly forging bank documents used to cheat CIMB Bank.
In 2020, he had purportedly forged two documents stating that he had owned and sold property in Macau to justify deposits amounting to HK$143.8 million in his CIMB Bank account.
He also allegedly forged a document stating he had a loan agreement to justify the deposit of HK$7.5 million in that same CIMB Bank account.
Zhang is expected to plead guilty on Apr 30. He is represented by two teams – lawyer Eugene Thuraisingam and his eponymous law firm, as well as a team from RS Solomon.
Around S$109.8 million in assets related to him and two companies he owns with his purported girlfriend Lin Baoying – Golden Eagle Assets and Golden Eagle Family Office – have been seized by the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) or issued prohibition of disposal orders, which means that they cannot be sold.
Lin also faces three charges in relation to the ongoing money laundering case – two for forging documents to cheat CIMB Bank and OCBC, as well as one for intentionally perverting the course of justice by falsely telling a CAD officer that her assistant had prepared one of the forged documents. She is in remand.
Zhang and Lin, both Chinese nationals, are among 10 foreign nationals facing various charges linked to Singapore’s largest money laundering case, where more than S$3 billion in assets have been seized or frozen.
Besides Zhang and Lin, three have been sentenced to between 13 and 14 months’ jail, while two others are expected to plead guilty.
The remaining three are in remand.
