Kelong Kings: Confessions of the world's most prolific match-fixer (46 page)

I was planning to
share the Benin match with Dan and keep Mozambique for myself.

"Alassane is in
Angola already", Dan said to my surprise. "But you promise
me that you will not give him any trouble".

It's the nature of
our business. Dan had sent Alassane to Luanda as a scout to survey
possible business opportunities. Whereas I already had my network in
place, Alassane was roaming the town hoping that he could approach a
few players for a last minute fix.

"OK, don't
worry", I reassured Dan. "I am here on business. I don't
want any trouble myself. You just tell that fucker to come over and
see me".

Alassane popped out
of nowhere and we met for the first time after his betrayal at the
Gold Cup in the United States. He was afraid that I would hurt him
but I had given Dan my word that I wouldn't have. I got Alassane in
touch with the Beninese players before their match against Egypt then
left for Lubango, southern Angola, where Mozambique was set to play
against Nigeria. I knew a few of the Mozambican players because I had
flown them to Malaysia in 2008 for the Merdeka Cup, but, when I
landed in Lubango, there was not enough time to speak to them and
reach a compromise. I dropped my fix and decided to watch the match
as a simple spectator. Meanwhile, my boys from Benin ended up losing
2-0 to Egypt in Cabinda, allowing Dan and I to win money on the
handicap. After the Africa Cup of Nations' last group stage matches
were over, I headed back to Singapore to attend my trial's court
hearing.

The
hearing was due to begin at nine o'clock in the morning on January
27
^th
,
2010, but I got there late. I didn't oversleep; I simply went to the
wrong courtroom and ended up being ten minutes tardy. The court had
been taken down for 15 minutes to wait for me. As I looked
frantically for the correct courtroom, I spotted my lawyer who was
waiting for me in the corridor.

"The
prosecution is asking for corrective training", he said. "They
dug up your file and treated you like a repeat offender".

Corrective training
meant five years without reduction and no possibility of remission;
minimum five years you have to sit. I was one of the most proficient
contributors to the economy of Singapore and yet they wanted to send
me to corrective training. CT is for worthless people who can't fit
into society: rapists, molesters and drug traffickers, not for
someone who has had an argument over a parking ticket. I was shocked.
Fuck.

"For this
offense, they want to give me five years without remission? What did
they write in the corrective training report?" I asked my
lawyer.

I was in the dark,
not knowing what was going on. I hadn't paid due attention to my case
and now I realized that I had grossly underestimated the entire
incident. I hoped that the judge would not agree with the
prosecution. My mind was racing.

"What can I do
not to go to court?" I thought. "Shall I go to the toilet
and fake an epileptic attack or something and be hospitalized?"

I needed time to
think about my next move; there was no fucking way that I was going
to sit behind bars for five more fucking years. As I stood gazing
into open space, the court reconvened and my lawyer rushed me inside.

"Hey, come,
come", he uttered in a preoccupied tone, "the court is
waiting".

I stood on the
doorstep in a daze, not wanting to walk in.

"Corrective
training", the words echoed in my head.

I walked in
hesitantly and sat down in the dock. Everyone around me was talking
but their words produced an indistinguishable babel that I could not
decipher; I could not understand what they all wanted from me. My
lawyer submitted my written mitigation on the incident and the judge
noticed that there were some discrepancies between my account of the
events and the prosecutor's.

"The accused
accelerated the vehicle and hit the victim on the right knee once,
then accelerated his car again and hit the victim a second time in
the same spot", the prosecution claimed.

My version was that
I drove very slowly and neither harmed nor intended to harm the CISCO
security guard. I mean, even at five kilometers per hour, if I knock
into you with my car, you will not stand there like the CISCO
security guard did; you'll be sent flying to the ground. It's just
common sense. And how could I hit a person twice on the same knee and
have him suffer a mere contusion? The entire scene was recorded on
CCTV but the judge never saw the recording because I had pleaded
guilty; there was no reason for him to examine the evidence. Still,
my written account of the events had struck the right note.

"There is a
qualification in this mitigation", the judge said to my lawyer.
"It looks like your client is retracting his plea, doesn't agree
with the prosecution and that the mitigation conflicts the charges".

I was so blacked out
that I didn't hear the judge's next question.

"Does your
client wish to retract his guilty plea?"

It's exactly what I
wanted to do but I was in a mist and my lawyer didn't ask the judge
to stand the matter down to consult me. Even a lawyer who had just
completed his pupillage would have known that it was the correct
thing to do. The judge himself should have realized as much, since we
had tendered the mitigation after the court had reconvened. There was
no possibility that we could have anticipated the judge's request; he
should have told my lawyer: "Speak to your client first. Why are
you answering on his behalf without asking him for his opinion? Stand
the matter down and consult your client".

The judge didn't say
what he was supposed to say and my lawyer didn't do what he was
supposed to do. No one gave a fuck whether I understood the nature
and consequences of what I was facing. My lawyer simply said: "Your
honor, my client doesn't want to retract his plea".

Five years, fuck,
I'd go crazy. But that is how the judges in Singapore saw it: three
crimes on three different occasions, five years. Repeat offender.
It's common practice in the Singapore courts.

"Ha, ha",
I could almost hear the judges' rumbling laughter as they sat
discussing my case before lunch.

"This fucker is
in court again! We're going to whack him really hard this time".

The Singaporean
legal system saw its chance to nail me and it did.

"No doubt the
offense is of a very mild nature", said the judge in his
conclusions, "but you have too much disrespect for law
enforcement officials and that is why I'm giving you five years of
corrective training".

Bam.

The CISCO officers
were no law enforcement officials; they were private security guards.
If they had been law enforcement officials, they would have
handcuffed me, placed me under arrest and searched my vehicle.
Instead, they had to call the police to come and conduct the
investigation on my car. It was a shame that a seasoned judge didn't
know or care to acknowledge the difference between law enforcement
officials and private security guards.

"Put him in
jail for three weeks", the judge ordered, "so that I can
carry out a mental evaluation to see if he's fit for corrective
training".

I was sent for three
weeks in the Changi Prison Complex, during which time I underwent a
psychiatric evaluation. Once inside, as I read a copy of my trial's
transcript, it dawned on me.

"Fuck", I
thought, "I had the opportunity to retract my plea and my lawyer
didn't tell me".

I immediately called
him.

"Why didn't you
ask me whether I wanted to retract my plea?" I asked.

"I did ask
you", he defended himself.

"You
mother-fucker", I shouted at him. "Somebody gives me five
years in prison and you think that I don't want to retract my plea?
Is that what you're saying? You think that Wilson Raj is ready to put
his neck on the chopping block for somebody to chop it without
retracting his plea? You're a fucking liar!"

I was so angry that
I sent a message to Rajendra Prasad, who had introduced this joker to
me.

The message read:
"Rajendra Prasad, you are like a devil in my life. You came into
my existence and I lost 500 thousand dollars on the Monomotapa United
game in Tunisia. Every time I used your on-line betting accounts I
lost money. Then you took 400 thousand dollars away from me together
with Ah Kang. I sent you to China for the match against Botswana and
you fucked that up too. Then you tried, together with Manimaran, to
pull the rug from under my feet in Syria. Finally, I ask you for a
lawyer and you get me this mother-fucker that gets me convicted to
five years for an argument with a security guard. What the fuck is
wrong with you?"

I fired the lawyer
and asked my family to engage another counsel. They hired a prominent
Singaporean criminal lawyer. When his assistant came to see me in
prison, I immediately asked him to submit an application to retract
my plea on grounds of negligence in my representation. My new lawyer
and I claimed that it was the defense counsel's duty to check with
the prosecution on whether they were going to address the court on
the day of the sentence. The prosecutors promptly replied that my
former lawyer had indeed been informed, a circumstance which he
vehemently denied. The court rejected my application and did not
allow me to retract my guilty plea.

On
February 17
^th
I
was escorted back to court. The psychiatric evaluation report had
been filed and it stated that I was fit for corrective training but
that my chances of offending again were slim. Somehow the report was
slightly in my favor but the prosecution opposed its findings. I
appealed in order to retract my plea; my new lawyer argued that the
judge had the duty to inform me of the request for corrective
training before the day of the sentence.

"The court did
not know about the antecedents of the accused", replied the
judge. "It was therefore impossible for the judge to tell the
accused that he was going to be convicted to five years of corrective
training ahead of time".

This was the same
judge who had sentenced me to one year for the assault on Ivica
Raguz; maximum punishment. He had then sent me in for the fist fight
with my girlfriend's sister's boyfriend, illegal assembly and for
false information; maximum punishment for all of them. Even back then
he had told me that, under normal circumstances and had the law
granted him the power, he would have slapped me with corrective
training. And here I was again sitting in front of him; one could
hardly believe that he had no prior knowledge of my antecedents.

"You're a
fucking dishonest, prejudiced, biased and vindictive bastard", I
wanted to shout in his face, but I kept silent.

The application to
retract my plea was dismissed and I was sentenced to five years of
corrective training. I appealed against the dismissal of my
application and against my conviction in an attempt to buy time. I
filed a request for a criminal revision of my case in the High Court
as well. The appeal trial was scheduled for July. The judge set my
bail at 40 thousand Singapore dollars; I got Mega to bail me out
asap.

As soon as I was
released, I tried to apply for a new passport. I told the authorities
that I needed to leave the jurisdiction to terminate some business
overseas but they didn't buy my claims. The prosecution was ready to
contest my request because they claimed that I was at flight risk and
that they had heard rumors that I was planning to jump bail. How
these rumors had come by the prosecutor's ears was a mystery. My
lawyer suggested that I drop the idea.

"It is best you
cancel your passport application", he argued, "because the
judge has the power to withdraw your bail and lock you up again".

I had filed similar
requests in the past and had been allowed to leave the country
without any hassle, each time duly returning to Singapore when my
business abroad was over. This time around the Singapore authorities
were beginning to terrorize me: I felt cornered; I needed a way out.
My lawyer waited for the grounds of decision, consulted his advisers
and came up with his conclusion.

"There is no
way out of this", he bowed. "The court had no obligation to
inform the accused that they were going to ask for corrective
training because they examine one's antecedents only after hearing
his plea".

I was not satisfied
with my lawyer's explanation and sought a senior counsel to replace
him. The counsel asked for an upfront fee of 100 thousand Singapore
dollars, the unsettling part being that the request was made before
he even looked at my notes of evidence and prior to his knowing
whether I had any chance of success. There was no use in paying 100
thousand dollars on a lost cause so I gave that attempt up as well
and awaited nervously for someone, anyone, to present me with a
plausible way out.