Singaporean nabbed for forgery after two years on the run

NELSON Loh (pic), co-founder of Novena Global Healthcare Group (NGHG), and his employee Michael Wong have been arrested and charged, the police said.

The two men, both 43 and Singaporean citizens, were charged in court on Monday.

Loh had been a director at NGHG and its related companies while Wong, also known as Wong Soon Yuh, was an employee of the group who worked closely with him.

They left Singapore in early September 2020 and had been wanted by the police for the last two years.

Within days of their departure, the police received a report that signatures of accounting firm Ernst & Young (EY) had been forged on some of NGHG’s financial statements.

A warrant of arrest and an Interpol Red Notice were later issued against each of them.

According to Interpol’s website, the notice requests law enforcement units worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a person pending extradition, surrender or other legal action.

The police said: “With the cooperation and assistance of our foreign counterparts in the People’s Republic of China, the two men returned to Singapore on Dec 24 and were arrested by the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) on the same day.”Both men, who are facing two charges over forgery offences each, allegedly forged financial statements of NGHG in 2019, and used them to obtain bank loans amounting to S$18mil (RM58mil).

According to charge sheets, around July 2019, Loh allegedly affixed EY’s electronic signature on NGHG’s financial statements for its 2018 financial year with the intention of using these documents to cheat Standard Chartered Bank into disbursing loans to the company.

He allegedly did this again around October 2019, this time to cheat Maybank Singapore.

On both occasions, Wong allegedly submitted these documents to Standard Chartered Bank and Maybank Singapore, thereby cheating the banks into disbursing loans of S$15mil (RM49mil) and S$3mil (RM9mil) respectively to Novena Global Healthcare, a subsidiary of NGHG.

If convicted, they can be jailed for up to 10 years and fined.

NGHG was set up by Loh and his cousin Terence Loh. Several companies linked to the two, including Novena Global Healthcare, were earlier reported to be facing enforcement action for failing to file annual returns.

The cousins first made headlines in 2020 over their £280mil (RM1.4bil) takeover bid for English Premier League club Newcastle United. — The Straits Times/ANN