Kelong Kings: Confessions of the world's most prolific match-fixer

by Wilson Raj Perumal

  "No, we're not doing this", they said. "The guy is too huge".

  I was left with no choice but to do it myself.

  Quite a few people play grass hockey in Singapore. I got a hockey stick, a hockey bag, a jockey cap and shades; just like a hockey player, so that people would not wonder: "What the fuck is this guy carrying a hockey stick for?"

  Once I got to Woodlands Wellington's training ground I placed the hockey stick safely in a corner and began jogging on the track surrounding the pitch towards the Woodlands bench. The manager of Woodlands Wellington was an Indian like myself so I sat down next to him and tried to start a conversation; he was going to be my alibi later on. From the corner of my eye I saw Ivica Raguz and his teammate Max Nicholson leaving the stadium.

  "OK, I have to go now", I told the team manager. "See you around".

  I gave Ivica and Max about a 100-meter head start then picked up my hockey stick and followed them to the train station. I climbed in the train two compartments behind theirs and made my way towards them.

  "Fuck, three guys", the two players were not alone. "Ivica, Max and their coach".

  After climbing out of the train, Ivica and his companions headed towards the Orchid Park Condominium where he lived. Then, once in Yishun, the Woodlands coach took a different turn; now it was just the two of them, Ivica and Max. I was by myself but had a hockey stick with me, which was as good as five men. The time was almost right and, as I followed them more closely down the street, I questioned my resolve.

  "Am I really going to do it or not?"

  Siva had already placed our bet and I had given him my word that I was going to do it, so I swept all remaining doubts from my mind and closed the distance between the two players and myself. Ivica was on my left and Max was on my right; my right hand is the more powerful of the two so I moved a bit to the side and swung from my right, landing my blow right behind Ivica's knee. He collapsed to the ground, looked up and began screaming.

  "Fuck!" he wailed.

  Max turned around to see what had hit Ivica. When he saw a dark figure with a hockey stick in hand he too began shrieking in fear.

  "What the fuck?" he yelled and took off running without helping his friend.

  When Ivica saw Max run he jumped to his feet and began sprinting like a bullet train in the opposite direction.

  "Fuck", I realized, "this guy can still run. He's going to play tomorrow".

  I began chasing Ivica with the hockey stick in my hand but he was too fast, like a 100-meter dasher. Max was surely going to call the police so I could not be chasing Ivica in broad daylight for too long; I stopped running and made a U-turn. I noticed a guy cycling past the scene who was staring at me so I pulled my cap down over my eyes. Once he had cruised by, I threw the hockey stick in a nearby drain, flagged a taxi and went home. Then I called Siva.

  "I did it", I told him, "Max was also there. He took off. He shouted 'What the fuck' and took off".

  I hung up the telephone, changed my clothes and went to play football in Ang Mo Kio with my friends. On the following day, Ivica didn't play and Siva won his bet. I was supposed to get part of the profits, but I never had a chance to collect my share. In the end, I didn't earn one dollar from that match.

  On the following day, the news of my assault on Ivica Raguz was all over the local papers but neither Ivica nor Max could identify the assailant.

  Then, a few days later, as Siva, my schoolmate Rajah and I were sitting below Siva's block, suddenly, there was a massive commotion. What the fuck. Thirty or forty CPIB officers in plain clothes appeared out of nowhere shouting: "Na bei chee-bye! Don't run!"

  Pum! They ambushed us like a bunch of ruffians.

  As we were being arrested, Lutz and Mirko were picked up at their homes for match-fixing as well. We were all taken to CPIB headquarters and locked up in separate rooms so that we would not interact. At first, the CPIB couldn't find any reliable witness against me. During the identification parade, only Max Nicholson pointed his finger at me as the assailant but he was too shaky to be convincing; he had probably obtained some details on my appearance from the team manager that I had spoken to at the Woodlands Wellington training ground before the attack. Ivica couldn't identify the attacker among the people lined up in the parade and the cyclist that had witnessed the scene simply picked the wrong guy.

  My call to Siva after the attack was the only way that the CPIB could get to me. I suspect that Siva's telephone conversations were being recorded because, after the arrests, he immediately chose to turn prosecution witness against Mirko and Lutz and, had I contested the case, would have probably done the same with me. Either way, I was released on bail and my passport was impounded once again.

  Immediately, I tried to leave the country with a friend's passport but was arrested at the border with Malaysia by the Singaporean immigration. I was remanded and charged in court on the following day. Contesting the assault charges could have proved counterproductive since there were other, more serious charges, that could have surfaced had I chosen to stand trial; I decided to plead guilty and take the heat. The presiding judge slapped me with the maximum punishment for assault: one year behind bars.

  While serving my sentence I became a prison helper, which meant that I served food and carried out other chores, so I had the privilege of moving around a little more than the other inmates. One day I met Lutz, the German footballer, who was working in the prison laundry.

  "How are you Lutz?" I asked him. "Everything OK?"

  Lutz told me that he and Mirko had fought their case in court but had lost. They had been both convicted and Lutz had grown really paranoid about the prison's conditions; he could not believe that you had to take water from the toilet bowl to wash your face.

  "What the fuck is this?" cried Lutz, as he saw his prison-mates drinking from the bowl.

  For Lutz and Mirko, prison in Singapore was a total culture shock. Lutz told me that he had filed a formal complaint with the German embassy and that the ambassador had in turn complained with the Prison Department of Singapore.

  "What the fuck", said the Germans. "There is no water in your cells?"

  The German embassy lodged its complaint and everybody received extra water for some time, but it was not enough for Lutz.

  "Why is it that I'm in prison", he asked the embassy, "while the guy who gave me the money is not?"

  Siva had been let off the hook because he had turned prosecution witness but the German embassy was pressing the Singapore government to charge Siva with match-fixing as well.

  "What kind of judicial system do you have?" complained the Germans. "How come my citizen is in prison while yours is outside?"

  The whole story did not reflect well on the Singaporean judicial system; in the end there was some hugging and kissing and Siva was told: "Look. We have to charge you. Come and serve one month; a one-month holiday".

  Siva was finally locked up and ended up working in the prison laundry with Lutz.

  Lutz was not the only one who was unhappy with the prison conditions but, had he not been German, he would have paid dearly for voicing his complaints.

  Prison in Singapore had not changed much since my last detention. Sometime in 1999 I watched an inmate from my block seek medical help for three consecutive days and nights. He was given painkillers and finally passed away from heart failure after three long days of agony. Then, in 2001, a young prisoner was strangled to death by an older inmate. Usually, no young detainee should be placed in a cell with an older one; it was standard procedure which the prison ignored. All of these fuck-ups were covered up by the government to preserve the unblemished image of the prison department.

  I finally came out in September 2001 and Siva's family was blaming me for his arrest. I didn't feel comfortable with their attitude so I thought it best not to associate with my old friends anymore in order not to destroy yet another person's life. I moved away from all of my childhood acquaintances and chose to be a loner. I had been inside for almost o
ne year and, during that time, I had lost contact with all the bookies. When I was released I realized that things had changed dramatically: there was no more bookie's corner, Jalan Besar stadium had been torn down to undergo renovation and there was no more street betting; all of it was gone. Everyone was now using the internet to gamble. I didn't know how the web worked so I was on a standstill and couldn't find another occupation because of my criminal record; everybody knew that I was involved in match-fixing.

  I called Thana to be updated on our common acquaintances and he told me that Pal was broke. Thana also claimed that Pal had decided to use the floodlight scam that I had proposed to him in 1995; he had allegedly paid someone to switch off the lights during a September 2001 UEFA Champions League match between Barcelona and Fenerbahce in Turkey. Unfortunately for him, the stadium had a generator, the lights were turned back on, and Pal ended up losing three million Ringgit on a single bet. Thana had heard the story from his friend and bookie Yap, who claimed to have placed Pal's wager on the match.

  Since he was penniless, I didn't bother trying to contact Pal; I decided to stay away from fellow match-fixers and attempted to find another way to survive. I had no business and no job so, sometime in 2002, in order to rake up some cash, I decided to file credit card applications on behalf of some of my jobless friends. The scheme itself was pretty simple: I would go to unemployed people and say: "Hey. Would you like to make some money?"

  These were not total strangers; they were people who already knew me. I would coach them on how to declare a 60 thousand dollar income to the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore. Once the application was filed, the IRAS would send that person a tax return showing their income as 60 thousand dollars. I would then fill out a credit card application form in their name and attach to it their income as stated by the IRAS and their identification papers; then I sent everything out to the bank. Once the card was approved, the bank would send it to my home address. I needed to have the cards sent to my own home in order to prevent the real applicants from cheating on me. I helped them get credit and would then share it with them and use my cut for gambling. The scheme seemed to work pretty well and, at one point, I had ten successful applicants, until I teamed up with two friends of mine, Chandar and Roy, and the whole thing blew up in my face.

  We filed two applications at the DBS bank in Singapore; one for a renovation loan and another one for a credit card. Both applications were filed in Chandar's name, who was well aware of the scheme. The application for the renovation loan was prepared by Roy, who knew an employee at DBS who was ready to approve both requests. Chandar and I agreed to share whatever money we were to receive from the bank. But when the bank sent the credit card in Chandar's name to my home, another joker called Eddy, a friend of mine who was also aware of the scam, opened up the envelope, took the card and called the bank up.

  "How much cash can I withdraw?" the stupid fucker asked.

  "Hello Mr. Chandar", said a serviceable voice, "we need you to confirm your date of birth first".

  Eddy didn't have Chandar's information at hand so he hung up the telephone and the bank froze the card. When we tried to use it, the bank's cashier said: "The bank wants to speak to you, Mr. Chandar".

  Chandar was asked to show up at the DBS bank card center on the following day and I chose to accompany him. We spoke to the officer in charge, who was persuaded that we had used a fake IRAS form to apply for the card. As we left the bank with indignant looks on our faces, I tried to reassure Chandar.

  "Ours is an original IRAS tax return form", I said to him, "there is no way that we can be charged for any wrongdoing. Just you relax".

  Chandar then informed Roy about the issue with the credit card. The duo thought that if there were problems with the card, there were bound to be problems with the renovation loan as well, so Roy sought advice from his contact within DBS.

  "Get your friend Chandar to file a police report", the DBS employee told Roy. "If he lodges a complaint saying that his credit card application was filed by someone else without his consent, then at least the renovation loan will be approved".

  Chandar followed the man's advice and the complaint was lodged at the Bedok police station.

  "Wilson Raj Perumal used my name without my knowledge", it read.

  To make things worse, Roy then went to the DBS bank with another friend of his and filed a report against me there as well.

  Roy and Chandar were people that I had known for a lifetime. In 2001, Chandar had even started a company, World Wide Events and Sports International, which I used as a facade when I approached players. Both him and Roy were fully aware of the consequences of a police report in Singapore and had both been to prison before; they knew how fucked up it could be but I guess that they just didn't care.

  And trouble never comes alone. That same week, my girlfriend got into a fight with her sister and her sister's boyfriend used some vulgarities against her. I don't want to mention the girl's name but I was deeply in love and very attached to her back then. We had known each other for about a year and had spent a lot of time together. Her sister's boyfriend was a foreign student from India who was in Singapore to follow a marine engineering course at the Polytechnic. I called him up.

  "I want to speak to you", I told him.

  "What's the problem?" he asked.

  "I just want to speak to you", I repeated.

  We agreed to meet in Queenstown. I waited for him with Danny and a few friends and the asshole showed up with five or six boys behind him. We spoke but he was too arrogant and soon there was nothing left to say, so I threw a couple of punches in his face and fractured my knuckle. When they saw what was happening, his boys came to his aid and one of my friends began to swing his belt against them. Our discussion had turned into a brawl. Eventually, somebody called the police and we were separated. The investigation officer that showed up on the scene was a former schoolmate of mine.

  "What the fuck", he reprimanded. "Exactly how thick do you want your record to be? Come on, Wilson, do something with your life".

  After the fight, Danny, myself and two of the boys who were with us were charged with illegal assembly.

  On December 30th, 2002, my brother, his friend Mega and I were driving across the Causeway to Johor Bahru to have some food in Malaysia. At the ground border, when the Singapore immigration officer saw my ID, he asked me to step out of the car. Mega and my brother were allowed to leave while I was sent directly to police lock-up. I did not know that I was on the wanted list; for white collar crimes like credit card fraud, the police are supposed to send you a letter requesting you to turn yourself in but I had received nothing. I was locked up overnight and then, on the following morning, I was taken before the judge who charged me and remanded me for a week. After the seven days were up, I was remanded for another seven days and then another seven yet.

  In police lock-up they just give you a T-shirt and shorts, no underwear, and the temperature is 16 degrees. You'll be freezing. I had a very difficult time there. The police already had all the evidence against me but they pretended like they were gathering additional information from other banks about my credit card scams. I still remember the evil look on the senior investigation officer's face. His name was Steven and he was a real mother-fucker. The midget bastard was after me like I had fucked his wife behind his back or something and was giving me a really hard time. But three weeks is the maximum time that they can keep an accused in police lock-up for investigations so, after the third week, they were forced to bring me to court.

  I sat in the back of the prison van as it made its way to the Subordinate Court of Singapore. Sitting beside me was a CPIB officer and another prisoner, an Indian-Singaporean like myself, but of Sikh origin; his name was Salwant Singh and he looked very worried.

  "What's the cell going to be like?" he inquired.

  "I've been there before, it's not so bad" I tried to reassure him.

  As we neared the court, the CPIB officer handed a slip of pap
er to me; it read that the prosecution was asking for a 100 thousand dollar bail.

  "100 thousand dollars?" I exclaimed. "Why are they asking for that much money?"

  "Who asked you to become the CPIB's enemy?" the officer remarked.

  Fuck.

  When in court, the prosecutor took the stand and spelled out his request; the judge was shocked.

  "Why should I set a 100 thousand dollar bail for this case?" he questioned.

  The judge expected the prosecutor to come up with a plausible explanation but none was forthcoming so he halved the amount.

  "Bail set at 50 thousand dollars", he said.

  Not that it made a difference; I was broke and had no money to pay the bail, so I was sent back to the same old shit-hole, Queenstown remand prison. In Singapore, if you cannot afford bail, you will be remanded until your trial is over, then, if you are acquitted, you go back home; if you are condemned, you are sent to another prison where you will serve the remainder of your sentence. Remand prison is like a hub, 'interchange', they call it. Only high-profile inmates facing more than 20 years of detention will be spared time in Queenstown and sent directly to a maximum security penitentiary.

  Once again, Salwant Singh shared the police van ride back to Queenstown prison with me, where we were assigned to the same cell together with two other fellow Indians. In remand prison, wardens try not to mix the Chinese with the Indians because they know that we don't blend together very well. The moment we walked into the cell, Singh flushed the toilet and drank the water as it slid down from the top of the bowl before it reached the pool at its bottom.

  "Fuck", I thought, "no ordinary man will take water from there unless they were already prone to doing so before; this guy must be a seasoned criminal".

  Singh smiled.

  "Fuck, Singh", I exclaimed, "you mother-fucker. You've been here before, haven't you?"

  Singh and I exchanged information about our cases. He had been extradited from India where he had sought refuge to escape forgery charges in Singapore. Singh ran a telecommunication business that provided services to foreigners, expats and all those needing to make international telephone calls at cheaper rates. Only his rates were not cheap; he overcharged everyone heavily. The charges against him were so overwhelming that the court took half a day to read them out. Singh then explained that he had undergone Corrective Training before, which meant that he was a prison usual. Years later I learned that, as a young man, Singh was an officer in the army, a national serviceman, and that he was convicted for raping a young Chinese clerk. Despite his criminal past, Singh was the most interesting person in my cell.