A Singaporean court yesterday sentenced a celebrity Buddhist monk who ran one of the city-state’s most popular charities to 10 months in jail for fraud, a media report said.
Shi Ming Yi (釋明義), 47, and his former personal assistant Raymond Yeung (楊志恆), 34, were convicted last month of conspiring to take an unauthorized loan of S$50,000 (US$36,000) from the Ren Ci charity in May 2004.
Yeung was sentenced to nine months in jail, the online edition of the Straits Times newspaper reported yesterday.
He used the money to pay for renovations at a friend’s home in Hong Kong. Both Shi Ming Yi and Yeung had testified that the money was loaned to a Buddhist shop affiliated with the charity that sold religious artifacts, the report said.
External auditors found that to be untrue, as the loan was not mentioned in the shop’s accounts.
The high-living Shi Ming Yi, founder of the charity Ren Ci Hospital, which provides medical care for the elderly, had been described by local media as “the monk with the five C’s” — cash, credit card, car, condominium units and country club membership.
“Buddhist monks, we are no longer living in the mountains, we are not living in the forest. We are in the city now,” the Straits Times quoted Shi Ming Yi as saying.
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