SINGAPORE – A recalcitrant offender currently serving a 15-year jail sentence for a drug-related crime will be spending more time behind bars, after he instigated two prison officers to obtain for him classified information on other prisoners.
Abdul Karim Mohamed Kuppai Khan, 38, who pleaded guilty in May to offences under the Computer Misuse Act and traffic-related offences, was sentenced to 15 months’ jail on June 20.
He will start serving his latest sentence after completing his current one.
Abdul Karim was also disqualified from holding or obtaining all classes of driving licences for 15 years from his release date.
The secret society headman was serving his 15-year sentence at Tanah Merah Prison when he committed the offences linked to then prison officers Muhammad Fattahullah Mohd Nordin and Muhammad Zul Helmy Abdul Latip.
Abdul Karim was housed under the Administrative Segregation Regime (ASR) at the time.
ASR inmates are held in individual cells and have their privileges curtailed.
The prosecution said that such inmates are held for various reasons, including poor conduct and gang-related activities.
On five occasions between January and June 2020, Abdul Karim asked Fattahullah for the location of other inmates.
Fattahullah accessed the Singapore Prison Service’s (SPS) computer system and shared the information with him.
On Oct 13, 2020, Abdul Karim spoke to Helmy, as he wanted to find out some personal information on two other inmates, identified in court documents as V1 and V2.
Helmy retrieved the information from the computer system and shared it with Abdul Karim, who wrote it on a piece of paper.
Deputy Public Prosecutors Claire Poh, Gabriel Lee, Kelvin Chong and Louis Ngia had stated in court documents: “Fattahullah and Helmy acceded to (Abdul Karim’s) requests because they knew the accused was a disruptive inmate.
“They provided the information in the hope that the accused would not create trouble for them in the course of their work.”
Some time in October 2020, Abdul Karim threatened inmate V1 by saying that he knew V1’s home address.