<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR>Credit card cheat jailed four years
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->A MALAYSIAN hairdresser who owed money to a loan shark was offered a way of slashing the size of her debt.
All the loan shark wanted Aoh Wei Li, 32, to do was to use fake credit cards to buy $10,000 worth of items in Singapore.
For every $10,000 worth of merchandise she brought back, $700 would be taken off her debt.
But a day after arriving in Singapore in May, Aoh was arrested after spending $1,880 in seven purchases using the counterfeit cards. Within two hours here, she bought items such as a hair dryer, a slimming belt and a cellphone.
Aoh was jailed for four years yesterday after pleading guilty to nine counts of cheating. She could have been jailed up to three years and fined on each charge.
Investigations revealed that Aoh had been here in March as well, spending $700 on 14 purchases using a fake card.
Aoh had borrowed RM30,000 (S$12,600) from an illegal moneylender after her business failed last year.
Unable to keep up with the payments, she was forced by circumstances to commit the offences, her lawyer said.
Her accomplices are still at large. KHUSHWANT SINGH
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->A MALAYSIAN hairdresser who owed money to a loan shark was offered a way of slashing the size of her debt.
All the loan shark wanted Aoh Wei Li, 32, to do was to use fake credit cards to buy $10,000 worth of items in Singapore.
For every $10,000 worth of merchandise she brought back, $700 would be taken off her debt.
But a day after arriving in Singapore in May, Aoh was arrested after spending $1,880 in seven purchases using the counterfeit cards. Within two hours here, she bought items such as a hair dryer, a slimming belt and a cellphone.
Aoh was jailed for four years yesterday after pleading guilty to nine counts of cheating. She could have been jailed up to three years and fined on each charge.
Investigations revealed that Aoh had been here in March as well, spending $700 on 14 purchases using a fake card.
Aoh had borrowed RM30,000 (S$12,600) from an illegal moneylender after her business failed last year.
Unable to keep up with the payments, she was forced by circumstances to commit the offences, her lawyer said.
Her accomplices are still at large. KHUSHWANT SINGH