Man jailed, fined for role in syndicate that stored 58,000 vape items in ‘warehouses’

SINGAPORE - A man who was part of a syndicate that operated two “warehouses” containing nearly 58,000 vape products was sentenced to 10 months’ jail on Aug 19.

Nearly 17,000 of the products were vaporisers. One of the rented “warehouses” was a terrace house in Lentor, and the other was a condominium unit in the Canberra area in Sembawang.

Roy Tan Jun Jie, 34, was also fined $45,000 - the same amount he had earned while working for the group.

Tan was the first person from the group to admit being involved with the syndicate, and he must spend another six weeks behind bars should he fail to pay the fine.

Before handing down the sentence, Deputy Principal District Judge Kessler Soh noted Tan was not the leader of the syndicate.

Tan was an area distributor and occupied the lowest rung of the three-tiered syndicate. He had pleaded guilty on Aug 6 to being one of its members.

He also pleaded guilty to one count of being in possession of 31 vaporisers meant for sale.

In earlier proceedings, the court heard the group delivered up to 210 orders of vaporisers and components daily.

There were also 13 other people in the group, whose cases are pending.

Three of them - Wong Ee Wei, 29, Tey Ler Wei, 30, and Kenneth Tan Hong Chang, 31 - were alleged to be the local syndicate leaders.

Court documents stated they took instructions from a person known only as “Nobody”, purportedly based in Malaysia.

Among other things, the local syndicate leaders managed the “warehouses” and the group’s finances.

In October 2024, an unnamed friend introduced Roy Tan to a delivery job.

The prosecution said the latter was then introduced to Adrian Chia Hong Qing, 33, who was one of the local distributors in the group.

Their duties included meeting with the area distributors to hand them the orders for the day and collect earnings.

The DPPs said each area distributor was assigned a specific area to make their deliveries and receive payments.

Each area distributor delivered between 15 and 30 orders per day, earning $10 for every successful delivery.

Roy Tan used his car to make deliveries.

Court documents did not disclose how his offences came to light.

On Oct 16, 2025, the authorities seized nearly 20,000 of the vape-related items in the Lentor house, while more than 38,000 were uncovered in the Canberra property.

Roy Tan was arrested that day.

Shaffiq Alkhatib is The Straits Times’ court correspondent, covering mainly criminal cases heard at the State Courts.