A 44-year-old car salesman broke into his former girlfriend's home and stole 16 luxury handbags and branded accessories worth a total of $99,420, a court heard yesterday.
He wanted to make his former lover angry, so that she would contact him and they would be able to talk.
Rowan Wong Tin Heng was jailed for four months after pleading guilty to theft in a home. He initially faced a stiffer charge of housebreaking to commit theft.
A district court heard that sometime last year, Wong, a sales consultant at Komoco Motors, ended his relationship with Ms Hoe Huey Miin, 43, an assistant director at Recruit Express, as she was having an affair.
On Aug 5, at about 11.10am, he went to her Mohamed Sultan Road condominium while no one was in.
He entered the premises using duplicate access cards, which he had made while they were still together.
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Items that Rowan Wong Tin Heng stole from his ex-girlfriend:
- Purple Hermes Birkin handbag, $15,000
- Orange Hermes Birkin handbag, $15,000
- Black Hermes Birkin handbag, $8,500
- Blue Hermes Birkin handbag, $16,500
- Brown Hermes Kelly handbag, $10,200
- Pink Hermes Kelly handbag, $17,000
- Pink Hermes Evelyn handbag, $4,100
- Pink Hermes CDC bracelet, $3,150
- Black Hermes CDC bracelet, $2,800
- Purple Hermes CDC bracelet, $1,200
- Green Hermes CDC bracelet, $1,600
- Brown Hermes bracelet, $870
- Red Hermes Kelly Dog Extreme bracelet, $1,200
- Black Hermes Rodeo charm, $800
- Pink Hermes Rodeo charm, $600
- Purple Hermes Rodeo charm, $900
He took four Hermes Birkin handbags, two Hermes Kelly handbags, one Hermes Evelyn handbag, six Hermes bracelets and three Hermes Rodeo charms.
The handbags were worth between $4,100 and $17,000, the bracelets between $870 and $3,150, and the charms, $600 to $900.
Wong then drove home with the items, and kept them in his room.
Later that day, he threw away a pink Hermes Evelyn handbag worth $4,100 at Concorde Hotel's rubbish disposal area.
The next week, he handed all the other items he had stolen to a friend for safekeeping.
Wong lied that he had bought all the items for Ms Hoe while they were together, and that he was taking them back because they had broken up.
Wong also told his friend that he was staying with his wife, and did not want her to find out about the items.
Ms Hoe had bought all her handbags and accessories from boutique stores and resellers.
Wong was arrested on Aug 12, as he was caught on closed-circuit cameras entering Ms Hoe's condominium.
The prosecution asked for five to six months' jail, while defence lawyer Anthony Lim asked for a jail term of three to four months.
Mr Lim said that the couple "broke up on rather acrimonious terms after (Ms Hoe) started seeing someone else".
He said the incident arose as Wong "found it hard to let go of the romantic relationship that the victim and he used to share".
Wong has made restitution of $4,000 to Ms Hoe for the handbag that he threw away. Ms Hoe got back the remaining items.
