Property agent jailed for acting as fall guy

Nov 17, 2009

Property agent jailed for acting as fall guy

A PROPERTY agent who took the rap for an unlicensed driver's offence of running a red light was jailed for three months yesterday.

Leung Man Kwan, 34, accepted $1,000 to take the fall for Ms Evangeline Tay Su Ann, 21, who took a Bulgarian business manager's car out for a spin without his consent while he was abroad in January last year.

Leung is appealing against her sentence.

Ms Tay, who had been staying in the house belonging to the owner of the car, skipped the lights in Lornie Road. She knew she had been caught as she saw the camera flash go off.

Worried because she was driving without a licence and without the permission of the car's owner, she turned to friends for help.

One of them, former police officer Kelvin Choo Yew Beng, 38, secured Leung's complicity for $1,000.

When the car's owner received a summons asking for the driver's particulars, he asked Ms Tay about the offence. She gave him Leung's particulars.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Andrew Tan said one reason Leung agreed to take the fall was her own driving record: At the time, she had pending drink driving-related charges, so the extra demerit point for running a red light would have been of little consequence to her.

In November last year, she was jailed for two months, fined $4,800 and banned from driving for 18 months for hurting a public servant, drink driving, failing to give a breath specimen and disorderly behaviour.

Neither Ms Tay nor Mr Choo have been charged over their roles in the bribery.

It is not known whether Ms Tay has been charged over her traffic offences.

Leung could have been jailed for up to seven years and fined for subverting the course of justice.