Shell oil theft: Three face fresh charge

The three men were charged in connection with the theft of oil from Shell's Pulau Bukom refinery.
The three men were charged in connection with the theft of oil from Shell's Pulau Bukom refinery. ST FILE PHOTO
The three men were charged in connection with the theft of oil from Shell's Pulau Bukom refinery.
The three men hit with new charges were (above from left) Doan Xuan Than and Alan Tan Cheng Chuan PHOTOS: SHIN MIN FILE
The three men hit with new charges were (above from left) Doan Xuan Than, Alan Tan Cheng Chuan and Ng Hock Teck.
The three men hit with new charges were Doan Xuan Than, Alan Tan Cheng Chuan and Ng Hock Teck (above). PHOTOS: SHIN MIN FILE

The three men charged last Saturday in connection with the theft of oil from Shell's Pulau Bukom refinery were each hit with a new charge yesterday.

Alan Tan Cheng Chuan, 45, and Ng Hock Teck, 54, who have been charged with conspiring to dishonestly receive $160,000 worth of stolen gas oil on Nov 11 last year, now face a new charge of receiving 764.81 tonnes of marine gas oil worth $252,558 at Pulau Bukom's wharf 1E on July 24 last year.

The charge states that the stolen oil was transferred from Pulau Bukom to a Singapore-registered vessel, Sentek 26.

Ship master Doan Xuan Than, 46, a Vietnamese national, is accused of conspiring with Koh Choon Wei, 35, to dishonestly receive 1,133 tonnes of gas oil worth US$639,726 (S$847,000) on Dec 1 last year at wharf 6. He is said to have transferred the stolen oil to a Panama-registered vessel MT Gaea at Pulau Bukom. His first charge states that he received 1,348.8 tonnes of fuel worth $736,445 on Dec 31 last year by transferring the stolen property to the same vessel.

All three accused were represented by lawyers.

The prosecution sought a further week's remand for the trio for further investigations. Their case will be mentioned on Jan 25.

To date, 14 men have been brought to court over the multimillion-dollar fuel theft, the biggest in recent memory.

During an islandwide operation on Jan 7, police seized around $3.05 million in cash, as well as a 12,000-tonne tanker.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on January 19, 2018, with the headline Shell oil theft: Three face fresh charge. Subscribe