Sales manager jailed 21 months for selling drugs illegally
A former sales manager of a pharmaceutical company who sold more than 20,000 litres of cough syrup and 20,000 pills illegally was jailed 21 months yesterday.
Ashley Jas Ang Wei Hoon, 38, who worked for Beacons Pharmaceuticals, broke the law by selling an estimated 20,307.2 litres of codeine-based cough syrup between May 25, 2009, and May 26, 2010.This is the highest amount of cough syrup involved in such an offence in Singapore.
She also illegally sold 20 bottles of drugs, each containing 1,000 pills, including Diapo tablets, which contain the stupefying drug diazepam, and Panaco tablets, a codeine-containing medication for temporary fever relief.
In September 2008, Ang got to know Kim Tian Clinic assistant Soh Woon Mei.
In May 2009, Ms Soh called Ang, asking if she could help her order and deliver bottles of codeine-based Promedyl-B Linctus cough syrup to her Malaysian nephew, Wong Kin Yu.
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Ang declined, but accepted the offer later when she realised that she could not meet her team's sales target.
Ang told her administrative staff to create invoices under Beacons Pharmaceuticals for an order purportedly made by Kim Tian Clinic and used the invoices to collect the products.
On May 25, 2009, Ang drove to a carpark at Clementi Central to meet Ms Soh and was introduced to Wong. From then on, Ang continued supplying drugs illegally to Wong.
Ang was arrested in 2011, after the offences were discovered when the Health Sciences Authority conducted regulatory checks.
Ms Soh has since died while Wong is on the run.
Last month, Ang pleaded guilty to 60 charges - 30 counts each of forgery and supplying medicinal products that are not on the General Sales List.
Three hundred and thirty-five other charges for similar offences were also taken into consideration for sentencing.- Ronald Loh
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