SINGAPORE, May 15 — For S$500 (RM1,349), a man who helped three others cheat an insurance company by faking a multi-car collision will have to spend six months behind bars.

Abdul Rahman Aziz, 27, was sentenced yesterday after pleading guilty on Wednesday to conspiring to cheat AXA Insurance Singapore with fraudulent claims amounting to S$22,680.

The former food stall owner is among those recruited by Mohammad Shahel Mod Talib, the mastermind of a motor insurance and personal injury racket that cheated insurance firms of payouts ranging from S$2,200 to S$80,000.

Yesterday, a district court heard that Rahman was approached in 2010 by Shahel, also known as “Toki”, to stage traffic accidents for a S$500 commission.

After he accepted the proposition, Rahman was told to helm the last of three cars for a fake collision along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5 on Dec 13 that year.

The first car was to brake suddenly near a turn, so that Rahman’s car would crash into the car sandwiched between them.

They carried out the plan and one of the drivers lodged a police report and claimed damages from AXA Insurance a day later.

The insurer also received a letter of demand dated Jan 13, 2011, claiming S$22,680 for property damage and other expenses as a result of the accident caused by Rahman’s purported “negligent driving”.

It paid out S$18,000.

The fraud was exposed when NTUC Income lodged a police report in April 2011 for another sham accident put up by Toki’s syndicate.

Yesterday, deputy public prosecutor Yau Pui Man sought 12 months’ imprisonment for Rahman, citing the significant losses suffered by the insurer and precedent cases.

She added that motor insurance fraud affects a large segment of the public by driving up motor insurance premiums due to underwriting losses.

“Given that Singapore has a compulsory insurance regime, there is strong public interest to deter insurance fraud to keep a lid on increasing insurance premiums and to protect the wider public from having to suffer financially,” she said.

In March 2011, the president of the General Insurance Association of Singapore said the insurance industry had suffered S$411 million in losses from 2007 to 2010, driven largely by inflated and fraudulent claims.

Rahman also got another eight years’ jail and five strokes of the cane for nine drug- and traffic-related charges. — TODAY