FIVE of the six defendants in the City Harvest Church trial met in
February last year, after which some of them were concerned that they
were not on the same page about their defence.
This came to light in court yesterday after one of them, former church
investment manager Chew Eng Han, submitted as evidence a series of
e-mail messages in which they had discussed the meeting.
Questioned about the e-mail, former board member John Lam Leng Hung
said the five at the meeting were himself, Chew, deputy senior pastor
Tan Ye Peng, finance manager Sharon Tan and former finance manager
Serina Wee.
The only defendant not at the meeting was church founder Kong Hee. The
six of them face various charges for their part in allegedly misusing
some $50 million in church funds to boost Kong's wife Ho Yeow Sun's pop
music career, and to cover this up.
Chew had written in the e-mail: "After tonight's discussion, I'm
convinced we are substantially not on the same page in terms of the
substance of our defence, and I'm very disturbed."
He added: "From the way the conversation went, I'm quite convinced that
some are half-convinced that there has indeed been unauthorised usage
of the (church's building fund). If we don't have 100 per cent
conviction, we will falter in court and the defence will look weak and
doubtful."
When questioning Lam yesterday, Chief Prosecutor Mavis Chionh put it to
him that if he was an honest person who intended to tell the truth in
court, he would not be trying to meet the others or worrying that their
views on the charges were different. Lam disagreed.
Mr N. Sreenivasan, lawyer for Tan Ye Peng, also objected, pointing out
that "even an honest person in a joint trial will be concerned about all
the evidence, including the evidence of the co-accused".
"The suggestion that consulting your co-accused is dishonest will mean
that even I cannot sit down and talk about this case," he added.
The revelation of the meeting capped a day in which Ms Chionh charged
that Lam was using his fellow defendant Chew as a "scapegoat".
One instance was a "secret letter" that Lam had signed on behalf of the
church board, even though the board was not told of the letter and had
not given him the authority to sign it. (i'm no lawyer, but this surely can't be legal)
The letter was between City Harvest and Indonesian glassware firm
Firna, which is owned by long-time church member Wahju Hanafi.
The church had invested in bonds issued by Firna. The prosecution
believes these were sham bonds made to enable the misuse of church
funds, as Mr Hanafi had owned another firm that managed Ms Ho's music
career.
The investment had a clause that allowed the church to convert the
bonds into shares in Firna if bond monies were not repaid. But the
letter stated that the church would sell the shares back to Mr Hanafi
and his father-in-law at a nominal value of US$1 if the bonds were
converted into shares, effectively nullifying the church's protection.
Lam had said his understanding was that the letter was necessary to
convince Mr Hanafi's father-in-law, who held 20 per cent of the firm at
the time, to agree to the bonds. Lam said he had signed the letter
because Chew had assured him Mr Hanafi had no intention of enforcing the
secret letter's terms.
Asked why he had signed the letter without telling the church board,
Lam said he had left it to Chew to get the board's approval.
To this, Ms Chionh said: "Well, that's very convenient because Mr Chew
Eng Han seems to pop up very frequently in your explanations for why you
did or didn't do certain things."
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