Tutors Who Helped Students Cheat in O-Level Failed in Their Appeals

It has been a while since the now-defunct Zeus Education Centre’s principal and tutors were exposed for helping their students cheat in the O-level exams.

So, where are they now? And what have been the updates on the case since then?

How Zeus’s tutors helped their students cheat in O-Levels

Poh Yuan Nie, nicknamed Pony, the former principal of Zeus Education Centre, was paid $8,000 per student by Mr Dong Xin to provide tuition to a group of Chinese national students to help them pass their examinations and be admitted to local polytechnics.

Mr Dong signed contracts with Zeus, and for every student he referred to the centre, Pony would receive $8,000 in deposit and $1,000 in admission fees.

However, the contracts stipulated that if the students failed to pass, the money was to be fully refunded.

Zeus’s services extended far beyond basic tutoring. Prior to each examination, tutors Feng Riwen, Tan Jia Yan and Fiona Poh, Pony’s niece, would tape communication devices on their students sitting for the national exams.

Tan Jia Yan would sit for the examinations as a private candidate and livestream the paper she was sitting for to her accomplices using FaceTime via a hidden camera taped to her chest.

The other tutors would then work out answers to the questions and whisper them to the students, who each wore discreet skin-coloured earphones.

They were eventually caught on 24 October 2016, when an invigilator heard unusual electronic transmission sounds coming from one of the students in the examination hall.

She reported this matter to her superiors, leading to the student being searched. Communication devices were found on his body, and the entire operation was officially over.

The Sentences of Those Involved

District Judge Chay Yuen Fatt convicted Poh Yuan Nie, her niece Fiona Poh Min and Feng Riwen during a trial in 2020.

They were each found guilty of 27 counts of cheating.

Poh Yuan Nie was sentenced to four years in jail for acting as the “mastermind” of the scheme and orchestrating the operation.

Fiona Poh was sentenced to three years in jail, and Feng Rowen was sentenced to two years and four months in jail, as they had more minor roles in the scheme.

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The fourth person involved in the operation, Tan Jia Yan, was sentenced to three years in jail in 2019 after pleading guilty to 27 cheating charges.

During Tan’s sentencing, District Judge Kenneth Yap said the offences had undermined the principles of meritocracy.

Pohs’ Appeals to their Sentences

In 2021, Poh Yuan Nieh and Fiona Poh appealed against their sentences to Singapore’s High Court, but these appeals failed.

The aunt and niece then took the case to the Court of Appeal through a process known as a criminal reference, where their appeals were again rejected.

The issue posed to the court was regarding the interpretation of the word “dishonest” in the phrase “dishonest concealment of facts”.

While the pair’s lawyers argued that the definition of “dishonest” should be decided with reference to Section 24 of the Penal Code, the prosecution asserted that “dishonest” must be interpreted in the ordinary sense of the word.

The pair’s lawyers argued that the pair’s conduct should not be considered “dishonest”, or an act of cheating, for they did not cause the wrongful gain or loss of property.

However, the prosecution argued that they had cheated SEAB by “dishonestly concealing the fact” that their students were receiving help from Zeus’s tutors.

Yesterday (21 November 2022), the court sided with the prosecution, concluding that “dishonest” should be used to describe the mental state of the perpetrator when committing a cheating offence.

This is so that the cheating offence is not merely restricted to cases of deception involving the property.

Ultimately, this caused the Pohs’ appeals to their sentences to fall through.

With the Court of Appeal being the court of final appeal in Singapore, it seems like the Pohs have exhausted the options to appeal their sentences. Unfortunately, they will have to face the music for their actions soon.

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