Integrity Focus

A mortgage loan applicant, charged by the ICAC, was today (July 27) sentenced to eight months’ imprisonment at the Eastern Magistrates’ Courts for having deceived a financial services company into granting her a mortgage loan of about $3.8 million by making false representations about her occupation and salary. The illegal activities were revealed in the course of a corruption investigation.

Yeung Pui-hung, 54, property agent, was earlier found guilty of one count of fraud, contrary to section 16A (1) of the Theft Ordinance.

In sentencing, Magistrate Miss Minnie Wat Lai-man said the defendant was remorseless. She took a starting point of nine months’ imprisonment and reduced the jail term by one month, having considered the defendant’s full repayment of the mortgage loan concerned.

The court heard that in August 2018, the defendant submitted an application for mortgage loan of about $3.8 million with OCBC Wing Hang Credit Limited (Wing Hang Credit) through a financial intermediary. She falsely represented to Wing Hang Credit that she had been employed by a logistics company as a full-time logistics manager for over one year with a monthly salary of $120,000, and provided the relevant employment proof and bank account statements.

The loan application was subsequently approved by Wing Hang Credit and a drawdown of about $3.8 million was made in February 2019.

The ICAC investigation arose from a corruption complaint. Enquiries revealed that the logistics company had never issued the employment proof to the defendant, who had previously worked for the company at a monthly salary of only about $20,000. It was also revealed that the defendant had made various cash deposits in the amount of $120,000 into her bank account purporting to be the monthly salary she received.

Had Wing Hang Credit known that the loan application and supporting documents contained fraudulent information, it would not have approved her application for the mortgage loan.

Wing Hang Credit had rendered full assistance to the Commission during its investigation into the case.

The prosecution was today represented by Public Prosecutor Alison Mo, assisted by ICAC officer Andrew Ho.