SINGAPORE: Seven men linked to Singapore’s largest seizure of electronic vaporisers and related products were charged in court on Thursday (Feb 29).
The charging come almost a year after arrests at a multi-storey carpark in Sembawang led to a warehouse raid in Mandai that uncovered more than 85,000 e-vaporisers and related components prepared for sale.
The seven charged on Thursday are: Yeow Wei Feng, 27, Tham Jia Wei, 34, Goh Zheng Lei, 28, Tan Teck Jin, 21, Tan Ping Kang, 28, Muhammad Hailey Muizam, 23, and Sin Poh Meng Ivan, 29.
They are all Singaporeans except for Tan Ping Kang, who is a permanent resident and faces the most charges totalling eight.
Of the seven, Yeow, Goh and Muhammad Hailey were handed charges linked to possessing vapes or pods at a multi-storey carpark at Block 592, Montreal Link on Mar 28 last year.
According to a previous statement by the Health Sciences Authority (HSA), the police received a call for help at the carpark that night.
When officers arrived, they detained six people suspected to be involved in the illegal trade of vapes.
The driver of a van was found to be allegedly distributing parcels containing the illegal items to five people, who were allegedly helping to deliver the items to buyers.
HSA officers were activated to help in the operation, and several men were arrested.
THE MANDAI WAREHOUSE RAID
After obtaining leads from this investigation, HSA surveilled a warehouse unit in Mandai the following day, where supplies of vapes were suspected to be stored for runners to collect.
HSA raided the unit and seized more than 85,000 vaporisers and related components. Five suspected runners were detained at the warehouse.
HSA said at the time that the raid disrupted the operations of an illegal vape supply chain and was the largest haul by HSA, surpassing a seizure in 2021 where more than S$2.2 million (US$1.6 million) worth of items were seized.
Of the seven charged on Thursday, Sin, Tham, Tan Teck Jin and Tan Ping Kang were allegedly linked to the Mandai warehouse raid.
They were accused of conspiring to possess over 60,000 pieces of assorted pods for sale, and more than 134,000 sets of vapes for sale.
Tan Ping Kang additionally has extra charges for selling vape pods on Telegram.
The prosecution is seeking fines for most of the men involved.
The seven men are the latest to be charged over the March 2023 HSA operation.
Malaysian national See Hong Jian, who was involved in the Mandai warehouse operations, was sentenced to 10 months’ jail and fined S$16,000 on Feb 1.