Another ex-Shell Eastern Petroleum worker has admitted to stealing oil from a Singapore refinery as part of an ongoing series of prosecutions in the case.
Former gas safety tester Muhammad Ashraf Hamzah, 39, worked with others to misappropriate 55,321 tonnes of gasoil worth nearly $25m between 2014 and 2016, according to the Straits Times.
He received at least $700,000 for his role.
Ashraf pleaded guilty in a district court to nine counts of criminal breach of trust involving oil worth more than $18m.
Nine similar charges linked to the remaining amount will be considered during sentencing on 2 March.
Bought a Volvo
Ashraf also admitted laundering some of the cash by buying a Volvo car for $200,000.
In December, another former Shell employee, Sadagopan Premnath, 40, admitted to a role in misappropriating oil with a value of about $36.1m between 2017 and 2018.
Cases involving alleged accomplices, including Muzaffar Ali Khan Muhamad Akram, 39, and Juandi Pungot, 44, are pending, the report said.
The court was told that in 2007, Juandi and another man, identified as Abdul Latif Ibrahim, started the conspiracy.
They began to carry out "illegal loadings for the [1,600-dwt] Anic 1 bunker ship" (built 1983), owned at that time by Sentek Marine & Trading, said deputy public prosecutor Stephanie Chew.
She explained the pair would tamper with the bunker meter.
Between 2008 and mid-2013, the duo stretched their activities to involve other ships, and recruited Ashraf no later than 2010, the court heard.
Ashraf allegedly left the group in 2016.
Master jailed
In 2019, a Vietnamese tanker captain was jailed for five and a half years for his part in a plot to steal $150m of fuel from the refinery.
Doan Xuan Than became the second person to be sentenced in a sweeping case that had already seen 11 former Shell employees and several others charged at that point.
The 47-year-old master pleaded guilty to dishonestly receiving more than 8,000 tonnes of stolen gasoil on 10 occasions.
He was employed by Prime Shipping Corp from 2012 and captained the Vietnamese-owned, 12,000-dwt Prime South (built 2009), a ship used in the fuel scheme.
