Investigating officer coached witness on statement, says defendant's lawyer

Singapore

THE lawyer for John Soh Chee Wen, the alleged mastermind in the ongoing penny stocks trial, on Thursday argued that the prosecution's first witness was coached by the investigating officer (IO).

Senior Counsel N Sreenivasan, in his cross-examination of OCBC Securities remisier Ng Kit Kiat, queried the witness about his statement, in which he fingered 59-year-old Soh and co-defendant Quah Su-Ling as the ones placing unauthorised trades for accounts that belonged to a few other individuals, including Quah's mother.

Quah, 54, is former chief executive of Ipco International (now renamed Renaissance United).

Mr Ng said in the statement that it is likely that calls to his mobile phone from August 2012 to…