Shell oil heist: Jail for man whose offence prevented police from accessing crucial evidence
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SINGAPORE - A man who worked as an operations executive at a firm linked to the largest marine gas oil heist in Singapore’s history has pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice.
Wong Wai Seng’s actions had prevented the Singapore Police Force from accessing crucial pieces of evidence and delayed investigations into the heist, which took place between 2014 and 2018.
It involved more than $120 million worth of gas oil siphoned from Shell’s Pulau Bukom facility.
For committing the offence, the 53-year-old Singaporean, who was then working for Sentek Marine & Trading, was sentenced to two months’ jail on Jan 31.
According to court documents, the case involved five other men from Sentek Marine & Trading, a Singapore-based firm dealing with fuels.
Two of them were dealt with in court earlier. They are Wong’s older brother, Wong Wai Meng, also known as Robin, and another man identified as Wong Kuin Wah, also known as Davis.
At the time of their offences, both men were working as bunker clerks. They had helped the company acquire misappropriated marine gas oil.
Robin Wong, then 58, was sentenced to seven years, four months and two weeks’ jail on Jan 10, was ordered to spend seven years and six months behind bars.
The cases involving Sentek’s founder Pai Keng Pheng and Ng Hock Teck, who was then a manager at the firm, are still pending.
The case involving the fifth man, Mr Boo Pu Wen, 55, was abated after he died in July 2024
In August 2017, a Shell representative lodged a police report over unidentified losses of gas oil.
Investigations revealed that rogue Shell employees had misappropriated the fuel from its Pulau Bukom facility.
Several former employees who were key members of the group were also dealt with in court earlier
Between August 2014 and January 2018, the group secretly siphoned off more than 200,000 tonnes of gas oil worth more than $120 million.
Ng was arrested in January 2018, Deputy Public Prosecutor Vishnu Menon told the court.
DPP Menon said Pai told Wong Wai Seng to alert Robin Wong, Davis Wong and Mr Boo about what had happened.
The prosecutor added that Wong Wai Seng was aware the trio were involved in the dishonest receipt of gas oil from Shell Pulau Bukom and that Ng had been managing them in the enterprise.
According to court documents, Pai also instructed Wong Wai Seng to tell the three bunker clerks to leave Singapore as soon as possible.
Wong Wai Seng did as he was told and alerted his older brother on or around Jan 19, 2018. Robin Wong then flew from Singapore to Jakarta, before taking another flight to Medan.
Davis Wong and Mr Boo were on board two different sea vessels at the time.
DPP Menon said: “(Wong Wai Seng), over multiple phone calls, relayed (Pai’s) instructions to them not to return to shore, on how long to stay on each vessel, and on when to board new vessels that were bound to sail beyond Singapore’s port limits.
“(On Pai’s instructions, Wong Wai Seng also told the men) to throw away their work mobile phones, which contained WhatsApp and SMS messages relating to their involvement in loading misappropriated gas oil from Shell Pulau Bukom (onto two of Sentek’s vessels).”
The court heard that Davis Wong and Mr Boo later went to Batam. Robin Wong joined them on the Indonesian island in March 2018.
In November that year, Wong Wai Seng was instructed to go to the Police Cantonment Complex to give a statement. He told Pai about it.
Court documents stated that Pai then instructed him to tell the police that the bunker clerks were deployed at sea and that Wong was unable to contact them.
On Nov 20, 2018, the authorities recorded a statement from Wong, who told similar lies to an investigation officer.
In January 2021, the bunker clerks returned to Singapore and were arrested soon after.
The following month, Wong Wai Seng finally admitted to the authorities that he knew the trio had been hiding in Batam.
His bail was set at $25,000 on Jan 31, and he is expected to begin serving his sentence on Feb 17.
