$3b money laundering case: Second bank employee involved in crime gets 4 months’ jail

SINGAPORE – A second bank employee embroiled in Singapore’s largest money laundering case was sentenced to four months’ jail on Oct 24.

Chinese national Liu Kai, 36, a former relationship manager at Swiss private bank Julius Baer, had pleaded guilty to one charge of abetting Lin Baoying to submit a forged tax document in November 2020.

Lin, a Chinese national who holds passports from Cambodia, Dominica and Turkey, is the only female among the 10 nationals convicted in the $3 billion money laundering probe.

She was sentenced to 15 months’ jail in May 2024.

Court documents showed that Lin contacted Liu on Aug 2, 2020, asking if she could open a bank account in Switzerland through him.

Liu told Lin about the requirements to open a bank account, and explained that she would need to provide supporting documents to prove her identity and her source of wealth.

She told Liu that her income was from trading in web domains.

Lin then asked Liu what Chinese tax documents look like, and asked for templates. She also asked him whether the taxpayer identification number was the same as the Chinese Resident Identity Card number, and the amount of taxes that should be reflected in the document.

The former Julius Baer employee sent samples of tax documents to Lin despite suspecting that Lin intended to forge the documents.

On Nov 5, 2020, Lin sent a tax payment certificate to Liu as proof of her income to open a bank account with Julius Baer.

Liu noticed that the document had the same format as the sample certificate he had sent her earlier, with the stamps in exactly the same positions.

It was at this juncture that Liu realised that Lin had likely forged the document.

On Nov 7, 2020, he told her the certificate she sent did not meet the bank’s requirements, and that she should edit the certificate on Nov 18, 2020.

“The accused knew that Lin would have no authority to edit a tax document by herself, and understood that if Lin did what he suggested, the resultant document would certainly be a forgery.

“Despite this, the accused guided Lin as to how to edit the document in order that it would be consistent with her earlier representations as to the source and amount of income, such that the bank would accept it as a supporting document for her account-opening application,” said Deputy Public Prosecutor Jordon Li.

On Nov 23, 2020, Liu asked Lin to edit some figures in the forged certificate as they were blurry.

The next day, Lin sent him four similar revised versions of the Chinese tax document, with clearer figures displayed.

Despite knowing that the document was forged and that Lin’s source of wealth was questionable, Liu proceeded with the account-opening process and submitted the forged documents to the bank.

The prosecution sought a sentence of five months’ jail for Liu, saying that there was an abuse of trust on his part.

“As a relationship manager with the bank, he was entrusted with the responsibility of conducting first layer (checks) on new clients. Not only did (he) fail to carry out these duties, he actively acted against his employer’s interests,” said DPP Li.

Liu also acted out of financial interest, and admitted that he continued with the account opening process to earn a larger bonus as part of his bonus was derived from a percentage of new assets deposited with the bank by new clients he brought in.

Liu’s lawyer, Mr Anthony Wong from Lee & Lee LLP, told the court that his client did not forge the documents, and the bank account was never opened for Lin, hence resulting in no financial losses or harm.

In sentencing, Principal District Judge Toh Han Li said Liu had moderate culpability as he knew that the documents were forged and had guided Lin on how to edit the documents.

No harm was done in this case, but if the harm had happened, it could have been serious, given that Lin had laundered money through other banks.

Liu’s conviction comes after former Citibank employee Wang Qiming was sentenced to two years’ jail on Oct 23.

Wang was convicted of two counts of forgery, one count of money laundering and one for the obstruction of justice.

He had clients that included three of the 10 foreign nationals implicated in the case – Vang Shuiming, Su Haijin and Su Baolin – and was found to have forged documents to conceal the source of funds belonging to Su Baolin.

Wang, who had also forged remittance receipts for his other clients, was exposed when Citibank’s anti-money laundering team raised queries about large deposits that were made to their accounts.

Wang’s lawyer, Mr Vinit Chhabra from Vinit Chhabra Law Corporation, said he would be appealing against the sentence.

For forgery, an offender can be jailed for up to 10 years, and shall also be liable to fine.