Blame game continues as 62-day trial involving Hin Leong founder O.K. Lim wraps up

The blame game continued on the final day of a 62-day criminal trial of Hin Leong founder Lim Oon Kuin.

Among questions raised is whether he or his former personal assistant Serene Seng allegedly gave instructions to employees to make fraudulent discounting applications to HSBC to induce the bank into disbursing some US$111.6 million (S$151.7 million) to the embattled oil trader.

In his closing submissions on April 12, Deputy Chief Prosecutor Christopher Ong said: “The defence claims that Lim had nothing to do with the transactions, but for some reason, some employees masterminded a US$110 (plus) million deal to benefit Hin Leong.

“The prosecution’s case is that Lim instructed his employees to perpetrate the fraud in order to raise funds urgently because Hin Leong, his life’s work... needed faster cash flow in March 2020 to deal with margin calls.”

“We have shown Lim to be completely unworthy as a witness and the three charges have been proven beyond reasonable doubt, and (Lim) should be convicted on the three charges.”

Lim, better known as O.K. Lim, faces 130 criminal charges involving US$2.7 billion in alleged fraudulent loans disbursed, three of which have proceeded to trial in the State Courts.

The former oil tycoon was charged with cheating HSBC by representing to the bank, through Hin Leong’s employees, that the company had entered into two contracts for the sale of oil with China Aviation Oil (Singapore), or CAO, and Unipec Singapore, which the prosecution said were “complete fabrications, concocted on (Lim’s) directions”.

It alleged that Lim instructed Hin Leong’s employees to make fraudulent “discounting applications” to HSBC based on bogus invoices and forged documents in relation to these purported transactions. As a result, the bank was allegedly “dishonestly induced” into disbursing the monies to Hin Leong.

The prosecution argued that Lim had instructed former contracts executive Freddy Tan to create the documents for the bogus CAO transaction and to send them to the banker department, which handled discounting applications by Hin Leong to the banks. These documents were then sent to HSBC for discounting.

This was supported by the fact that Mr Tan consistently implicated Lim as the one who gave him these instructions in his first four statements to the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) in June and August 2020. He also said Lim could have given him these instructions directly in a statement recorded by then judicial manager PriceWaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services in October 2020.

But in May 2023, Mr Tan changed his position and testified in court that Madam Seng had given him these instructions after supposedly recalling her involvement after having “thought deeper”. This defies belief, Mr Ong said, because Mr Tan “could not provide any details about these belated recollections, or how he arrived at them... and could not identify which documents, or what about them, had prompted these sudden memories”.

“We thus urge the Court to find that Tan’s credit has been impeached, and to prefer the evidence in his June and August 2020 statements over his testimony in court,” Mr Ong said.

He added that the shifts in Tan’s testimony showed that he was “trying to insert Madam Seng as a ‘buffer’ between himself and Lim, in the hope that it would lessen his culpability for these transactions”.

When asked by State Court Judge Toh Han Li why Tan would implicate Lim, Senior Counsel Davinder Singh, who represents Lim, said it was “because (Tan) was trying to help Seng”.

But later, when asked by the judge why Tan would “have (Seng’s) back and then change his evidence in court,” Mr Singh replied: “Why would Freddy come to court knowing that he had said something different earlier, unless it dawned on him that on the stand, the consequences of perjury are very serious?”

On Lim’s credibility as a witness, Mr Ong noted that Lim’s response to questions on whether he had asked Mr Tan and senior contract administrator Chee Li Li to submit forged sales contracts to Ms Katherine Ong, a former accounts executive at Hin Leong, and Ms Hng Shiau Siang from its treasury department, are “crucial material admissions”.

Lim had said: “We did not plan to cheat banks for financing. It is common for oil companies to submit sales contracts to the banks for financing, based on verbal confirmations. This is to get faster cash flow.”

Mr Ong asked the court to find that Lim had instructed Tan to fabricate the documents relating to the fraudulent CAO discounting application, in view of Tan’s June and August 2020 statements to the CAD, which are corroborated by Lim’s own admissions, and the evidence of the Lim’s involvement in Hin Leong’s financial matters.

Mr Singh challenged the assertion that Lim played a central role in relation to actions in this matter.

He noted Ms Ong had testified she “cannot remember if she or another colleague had entered the details of the CAO and Unipec transactions into the cashflow spreadsheet”.

On when Lim was told about the margin calls, Ms Ong had testified that “it should have been after the discounting applications were entered into the spreadsheet. In other words, it was impossible for Lim to have given instructions to fabricate or discount,” Mr Singh said.

Mr Ong also argued that Madam Seng’s evidence in court should be given full weight because in admitting her own involvement in the fraudulent Unipec transaction, “she opened herself to criminal liability and liability in the civil suit she is facing”.

But Mr Singh challenged this, saying Madam Seng “gave evidence that she hopes the court will be merciful when the time comes. In other words, she had a motive. She was hoping that if she was the one who said this, she might be able to get some credit for it”.

Mr Ong disagreed. “She would only have motive to falsely implicate Lim if she is the mastermind. But defence has not established any reason why she would mastermind these transactions.”

Lim, his two children and Madam Seng are being sued for US$85.3 million in damages by HSBC. Lim and his two children are also being sued by Hin Leong’s liquidators over US$3.5 billion in alleged debt. Both cases are being jointly heard in a civil hearing in the High Court.

The prosecution also argued that HSBC had relied on representations and had been induced to pay out the US$111.6 million to Hin Leong. “The defence’s case is that HSBC gratuitously gave out US$111.6 million to make fees that amounted to US$185,000, which is less than 0.2 per cent of the sums HSBC disbursed. This stretches credulity,” Mr Ong said.

But Mr Singh argued: “The statement of account reflects the fact that HSBC has kept the money. And because (of that), it was able to credit the current account and reduce the amount due from Hin Leong to HSBC... If, as a result of me being cheated, I kept the money, then cheating is not made out.”

In his summation, Mr Singh said: “This is a criminal trial where the burden is on (the) prosecution to satisfy this court that the charges have been proven beyond reasonable doubt. I have no obligation to come up with the theory or prove Serene Seng was the mastermind.”

He noted there are “unbridgeable gaps in the prosecution’s case; unravelled evidence from its witnesses; lies from some of them, and reliance on someone whom it will be travesty of justice to describe as an unusually convincing witness; coaching a witness on what to say and what not to say about specific transactions; deleted calls lost, statements given under outrageous, egregious and disgraceful circumstances. ... And despite all of that, they say they have proven their case beyond reasonable doubt.”

“Given the way the evidence has unfolded and the way prosecution has changed its case a number of times, the only fair outcome is that they have not proven their case beyond reasonable doubt” and for Lim to be acquitted, he said.

The verdict will be delivered on May 10.

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