$10,000 spending spree lands man in prison

A man who spent an extra $10,000 wrongfully credited into his savings account was jailed for three months yesterday.

Muhammad Dzulhisham Rusly's former employer, WMG, a distribution mailing house, had mailed him a cheque for $1,015 after his services were terminated in June last year. The sum represented his last-drawn salary from the company.

The 24-year-old deposited the Standard Chartered Bank cheque into his POSB savings account. A week later - on July 5 - the company's accountant was looking through the records when she discovered that the cheque that had been issued to Dzulhisham had been deposited for a sum of $11,015 instead of $1,015.

She asked for a copy of the cheque from Stan-Chart and found out that the amount printed on the cheque was for $1,015, but the amount written on it was $11,015.

She lodged a police report. Dzulhisham was arrested on July 27.

Investigations showed that $11,015 - which represented an additional $10,000 - was deposited into his savings account on July 4.

In his statements to the police, Dzulhisham admitted that he had spent the money on his personal expenses.

He knew that an extra $10,000 had been credited into his account but did not try to find out who the money belonged to.

At an earlier hearing, the operations executive told District Judge Lee Poh Choo that he had used the money to settle loans and debts. He also said his family had financial difficulties.

Yesterday, Deputy Public Prosecutor Amanda Chong clarified that Dzulhisham had spent most of the money on himself and did not give any to his family members.

She highlighted that he spent up to $500 at clothing store Armani Exchange and up to $200 at Zara. He also spent some $1,000 on prawning activities over several weeks, bought electronic items and took an average of three taxi rides a day over four weeks.

He could have been jailed for up to two years and fined for dishonest misappropriation of property.

This article was published on May 8 in The Straits Times.

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