THE seven-year prison term imposed on corrupt barrister Eddie Soh Chee-kong for bribing former government lawyer Warwick Reid to fix prosecutions was manifestly inadequate, the Court of Appeal ruled yesterday.
Increasing the penalty to nine years, the Appeal Court said the trial judge erred by ruling that the sentences for all eight charges should run concurrently, since they were distinct and separate offences.
The court, comprising Vice-President Mr Justice Power, Mr Justice Mortimer and Mr Justice Sears, also noted that the offences took place over several years and that Soh was the key figure in the bribery.
It involved a huge sum of corruption money and a deterrent sentence was called for, the court held, satisfied that the proper overall term should be 10 years but taking one year off for mitigating circumstances.
Soh, 53, was found guilty after trial of eight bribery offences and was given a concurrent seven-year jail term for each of the charges by Mr Justice Saied in June 1992.
It was the Crown's contention that Soh had received a total of $7.07 million for fixing five prosecutions with Reid and would have received many millions more had three other corrupt transactions gone through.