Ex-Changi Prison officer jailed for leaking inmates’ locations to a prisoner

[ASEAN NOW News]

TODAY file photo  A view of the Changi Prison Complex.

 

SINGAPORE — When the supposed chief of a secret society asked Muhammad Fattahullah Mohd Nordin for confidential information on fellow Changi Prison inmates, Fattahullah used his position as a prison officer to get these details for him.

 

According to Today, he later admitted to doing so in the hopes that the inmate, who was known to be disruptive, would not create problems for him during his night shifts.

 

For his actions, Fattahullah was on Wednesday (Aug 24) jailed for 10 weeks.

 

The 38-year-old former employee of the Singapore Prison Service pleaded guilty to two counts of unauthorised access to computer material under the Computer Misuse Act, with two similar charges taken into consideration for sentencing.

 

A fifth charge of breaching the Official Secrets Act was withdrawn.

 

What happened

 

Fattahullah last held the rank of third sergeant and earned a monthly salary of S$3,400, the court heard.

He first joined the prison service as a corporal in 2008 and began working at Changi Prison from 2010 onwards.

 

Around 2017 or 2018, he was transferred to a cluster that included inmates placed in the administrative segregation regime. Inmates are sent there for distinct reasons, including poor conduct and gang-related activities.

 

They stay in individual cells and their conduct is reviewed about every three to four months, before a supervisor decides if they should remain or not.

 

Fattahullah became a personal supervisor working the day shift there, before being posted to night duty around November 2019.

 

He then got to know an inmate, Abdul Karim Mohamed Kuppai Khan, around 2018.

 

Abdul Karim, 36, who also went by the name “Dio”, was allegedly a chief of the Ang Soon Tong gang.

 

Fattahullah was also aware that he was a disruptive inmate.

 

On at least five occasions between January and June 2020, Abdul Karim asked Fattahullah for information about other inmates, including their locations in prisons across the country.

 

He usually did this by checking, through his cell intercom system, who was staffing the Housing Unit Control Centre.

 

If Fattahullah was there, Abdul Karim gave him an inmate’s number and asked him to check the cluster where they were located.

 

Fattahullah logged into the Prison Operations Rehabilitation System II (Ports II) system to give the other man these details, the court heard.

 

Prison staff members, including Fattahullah, receive training on the relevant Prison Standing Order that forbids the unauthorised disclosure, alteration, removal, or endangerment of classified material.

 

One time, Fattahullah declined to give Abdul Karim the home address of another prisoner who was a known enemy of Abdul Karim.

 

Abdul Karim had fought with the inmate, resulting in him being sent to the administrative segregation regime once more.

 

In a statement on Wednesday night, the Singapore Prison Service said that it commenced internal investigations into the matter in November 2020, after several contraband items and a note containing confidential information were found in an inmate’s cell during a routine check.

 

It did not indicate which inmate this was, but it said its investigations found that Fattahullah and another prison officer Muhammad Zul Helmy Abdul Latip, 34, had allegedly accessed and provided confidential information to the inmate on separate occasions.

 

The prison authorities immediately referred the case to the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau for investigation.

 

The two prison officers were also interdicted from service, pending the outcome of the investigation.

 

"They both subsequently resigned from service," the Singapore Prison Service said.

 

Fattahullah will begin serving his sentence on Sept 5 and remains out on S$5,000 bail.

 

For each offence of unauthorised access to computer material, he could have been jailed up to two years or fined up to S$5,000 or punished with both.

 

Abdul Karim has also been charged and his case is pending.

 

He is further accused of receiving confidential inmates’ information from Zul on four occasions in October 2020.

 

This information included other prisoners’ ages, residential addresses, and criminal charges as well as the contact details of their next-of-kin.

 

Zul has been charged and is set to plead guilty next month.

 

In its statement, the Singapore Prison Service said that it takes a profoundly serious view of any wrongful access and communication of confidential information.

 

"Any staff found to have done so will be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law, including being charged in court, as was done in this case," it added.