A Singapore court has sentenced an Indonesian man, who came as a tourist, for unlawfully encashing Marina Bay Sands Casino slot machine tickets worth SGD17,900. He had been arrested at Changi Airport in late March this year and then put on trial. The sentence has recently been passed.
The man, named Silitonga Andri Parulian, 27, had not robbed anyone, but he also did not return the tickets lying on the casino floor. The tickets had fallen out of a folder carried by a casino staff member.
Parulian, who had planned to play some casino games, spotted the dropped tickets, quietly picked them up, encashed all of them, pocketed the money, and tried to fly out of the country immediately. This was an unlawful use of the casino tickets.
According to state prosecutor Lim Yeow Leong, a casino manager named Tham Wan Nyit, who was in charge of slot-machine operations, had dropped them. Before the staffer could retrace his steps and find the tickets, they were already picked up by Parulian. The visitor was obliged to give the tickets to the casino security, but he quickly encashed them. All his actions were captured on CCTV.
The Indonesian never returned to his hotel and went to Changi Airport, where he spent the night. Meanwhile, he even managed to move some of the money to his bank in Indonesia, using Western Union Money Transfer. He managed to transfer several thousand Singapore dollars in this manner.
While all this was going on, the casino officials called the Singapore Police, who saw the Indonesian’s face on the CCTV footage. They sent out a ‘stop’ list to exit points around the island state; the tourist was identified when he tried to leave through Changi.
Even after being arrested, Parulian refused to return the money he had already transferred, and he would not tell the police what happened to the rest. During the trial, he pleaded guilty to dishonestly misappropriating money and was sentenced to prison.