Serial cheat jailed for fake gold scheme

He cheated over 40 of $85,648 over a year using tampered jewellery items

Nurfadly was also involved in other cheating cases. He was arrested on March 14 for drug offences.
Nurfadly was also involved in other cheating cases. He was arrested on March 14 for drug offences.

A serial cheat who duped several pawnshops by trading mixed metal jewellery that he passed off as genuine gold was sentenced to 41/2 years' jail yesterday.

Muhamad Nurfadly Rosli, 34, who faced 62 charges, pleaded guilty to 20 counts, including drug possession and consumption.

He cheated more than 40 victims, including pawnshops and individuals, of $85,648 over a year. No restitution has been made.

A District Court heard that in late 2015 or early this year, Nurfadly came up with the idea to create jewellery out of a mix of fake and genuine gold.

The resulting jewellery would be heavier and worth more when sold or pawned.

The fake and genuine gold pieces would be linked together to form a piece of jewellery.

This way, it was likely to be harder for pawnshops to verify if the item was made entirely of genuine gold.

On Feb 17 this year, he used a staff pass of another man to pawn five items at Lien Fatt Pawnshop in Woodlands and received $2,000 in cash.

He went to various pawnshops and conned the staff into believing that the mixed jewellery he presented was real gold.

He received $1,640 to $3,050 for the items.

Later, he became afraid that he might be exposed. So he enlisted the help of Saje Husiadi, 56, in the conspiracy to cheat pawnshops.

He would hand mixed jewellery to Saje, who has since been jailed 10 months.

Saje would present the mixed jewellery to pawnshops around Singapore and deceive the staff into believing that the jewellery was made of genuine gold.

Saje would then hand the cash proceeds and pawn tickets to Nurfadly, who would pay him $100 to $200 for each transaction.

Deputy Public Prosecutor David Koh said Nurfadly's co-accused included GrabCar driver Elvin Rahdyan Haji Nasrul, 30, who has yet to be dealt with.

Nurfadly also enlisted another co-accused, Tan Nurliyana, 21, to pawn items for him. On some occasions, he would direct Elvin to drive Nurliyana to the pawnshops. Nurliyana has been jailed for four months.

The court heard that Nurfadly was involved in other cheating cases.

He sold fake items to individuals and bought designer handbags and other items from victims without making full payment, or used dud cheques.

Nurfadly was arrested at Eunos MRT station on March 14 for drug offences.

Police learnt of his jewellery scam when a manager at Ban Joo Pawnshop made a report after the items pawned by Nurfadly were found to be forgeries during a verification and testing process.

The mixed jewellery had a genuine gold content of only about 4 per cent.

Nurfadly's sentence was backdated to March 16.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on December 16, 2016, with the headline Serial cheat jailed for fake gold scheme. Subscribe