METRO BOSS’ GRANDSON JAILED 2 YEARS FOR ATTEMPT TO BUY 400+G CANNABIS

The grandson of the Metro chain of departmental stores, Ong Jenn, was jailed 2 years yesterday in court for attempted possession of over 400g of drugs.

Ong is the grandson of Ong Tjoe Kim, the founder of one of Singapore’s local home grown departmental store chains, Metro, and the son of its former group managing director Jopie Ong, who helmed the company for 4 decades and stepped down in 2016.

Prosecutors had initially argued for more serious charges of conspiring with convicted drug dealer Mohamed Ismail Abdul Majid to traffic cannabis. The amount in question was 92.68g of cannabis and 385.1g of cannabis mixture. Mohamed Ismail Abdul Majid is currently serving a 22 year jail sentence for his role in the drug trafficking offence.

However, Ong’s lawyers had successfully argued for the court to reduce his charges to attempted possession of drugs by claiming that Ong had attempted to buy the cannabis to feed his own habit, not to traffic the drugs.

For the attempted possession of a Class A controlled drug, Ong could have been jailed for up to 10 years, fined up to S$20,000 or both.

Ong faces six other charges, including for the possession and consumption of cannabis. These will be dealt with at a later date.