Jail for man who ordered extra steel bars for firm, sold them to scrap dealer to pocket over $200k

The excess rebars weighed more than 800 tonnes in total.

At the time of the offence, Al-Hidayat Osman was an employee of Penta-Ocean Bachy Soletanche Joint VentureIn need of cash, an engineer at a construction firm ordered an excess of steel reinforcement bars (rebars) worth over $343,000, before selling them off to a scrap metal dealer for more than $200,000..

According to court documents, the firm had been engaged by the Land Transport Authority in July 2014 to be the main contractor for the construction of the Orchard MRT station and tunnels for the Thomson-East Coast Line.

Al-Hidayat, 40, who committed the offence on 14 occasions between January and June 2016, was sentenced to two years’ jail on Jan 27 after he pleaded guilty to one count of criminal breach of trust.

The Singaporean has made no restitution.

The court heard that Al-Hidayat’s job scope at Penta-Ocean included placing orders for rebars – which are used in construction projects – from two suppliers, Daehan Steel and Angkasa Steel.

After the rebars were procured, they were sent for processing at Wai Fong Machinery, Penta-Ocean’s sub-contractor.

The processed rebars would then be sent by Wai Fong to Penta-Ocean’s construction worksite around Orchard Boulevard, Paterson Road and Grange Road.

Some time between August and September 2015, Al-Hidayat approached a man identified as Mr Calvin Tan, who used to work for Wai Fong, telling him that he needed money.

He then proposed a plan to Mr Tan and obtained the latter’s agreement to facilitate it in exchange for money, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Kathy Chu.

Al-Hidayat carried out the plan from Jan 13 to June 11, 2016.

As part of the scheme, he ordered from Daehan or Angkasa more rebars than what was needed for construction. Al-Hidayat then sent a work order to Mr Tan, stating the amount of rebars that Wai Fong needed to process.

The court heard that after the rebars were processed and Penta-Ocean accepted them from Wai Fong, Al-Hidayat sent to Mr Tan a duplicate work order with the same reference number.

However, this document included the excess amount of rebars he had ordered from the suppliers.

Al-Hidayat then arranged with a transport company to collect the excess rebars and send them off to scrap metal dealer Tang Hai Hardware Engineering.

DPP Chu said: “The accused informed Tang Hai that his company had ordered excess rebars and that he was instructed to sell them. Tang Hai would pay the accused for the rebars which he had sold to them.”

It was only in mid-July 2016, when the quantity surveyors of Penta-Ocean were verifying the amounts claimed by the suppliers for payment, that Penta-Ocean discovered the discrepancy between the rebars purchased and the rebars received, the DPP said.

Al-Hidayat received more than $200,000 in cheques and cash from Tang Hai after selling over 800 tonnes of rebars, the court heard.

After that, he either encashed the cheques or deposited the cash into his own bank account.

Al-Hidayat did not share any of the illegal profits with Mr Tan, who alerted the police on Aug 24, 2016.

Court documents did not mention whether any action will be or has been taken against Mr Tan.

While under police investigation, Al-Hidayat denied any dealings with Tang Hai. He was finally charged in court in 2024.

Source: The Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.

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