Jail for scammer who pretended he was helping victims get govt grants

A scammer cheated two people of over $32,000 in total by duping the pair into believing he was helping them recruit staff and obtain government grants.

Separately, Lim Yi Xiang also cheated two others of another $680 in a scam involving online marketplace Carousell.

He was arrested in 2022 and absconded in 2023, before he was rearrested on June 25, 2024.

On Dec 30, Lim, 29, was sentenced to one year and two weeks’ jail after he pleaded guilty to charges including two counts of cheating involving $31,570.

Two other counts of cheating linked to the remaining amount were considered during sentencing.

One of Lim’s victims, identified in court documents as V1, bore the bulk of the monetary losses – $31,020 in total.

In 2019, V1 advertised online to hire four persons for a firm called Acteco Trading, in which he was a director at the time, Deputy Public Prosecutor Teo Siu Ming told the court.

Lim, who was then engaged as a sales sub-agent for another firm called Weistum Advisory, then contacted V1, stating that he could help the latter in recruiting the four staff members and obtaining two government grants – Career Trial and P Max – for Acteco.

For Career Trial, Lim told V1 it would entail training the new hires with course materials prepared by Weistum. He added that “V1 simply had to check the contents of the course materials to be eligible for the grant, which amounted to $28,800”, the DPP said.

Lim also told V1 that he would have to pay $4,640 to recruit the four additional staff members for Acteco, and 30 per cent of the grant to Weistum.

After V1 agreed to these terms, Lim obtained a physical copy of an existing template contract used by Weistum for Career Trial bearing its director’s signature.

But he doctored the document before giving it to V1 to sign, replacing Weistum’s company bank account number with his personal bank account number.

V1 then signed the doctored document and transferred a total of $12,590 to Lim’s bank account between November 2019 and March 2020.

V1 also made two separate cash payments to Lim totalling $690.

In the ruse involving P Max, Lim told V1 that this entailed sending the recruited additional staff members for courses conducted by the government.

He also told V1 that Acteco would receive a grant of $30,000 after the courses were completed and requested a payment of $17,740 for the “service”.

V1 then transferred $14,940 to Lim’s bank account and made a cash payment of $2,800 between November 2019 and March 2020.

When the promised services were not fulfilled, V1 contacted Weistum on Jan 7, 2021.

He was told that for Career Trial, Weistum charged only a fixed fee of $2,880 upon application for the grant, and an additional $2,880 after it is approved.

Weistum did not charge any fees over P Max, said the DPP.

With a similar ruse, Lim also cheated another victim, V2, of $1,080.

Weistum’s director lodged a police report on Jan 27, 2021.

In an unrelated case, another of Lim’s victim, identified as V4, went on Carousell on March 1, 2021, and wanted to buy an electric bicycle from Lim, who had posted that he was selling it for $700.

V4 transferred $550 to him, and alerted the police six days later when he did not receive the bicycle.

Lim has not made any restitution to V1 and V4.