The single mother of two who served time in jail for selling her curry puffs without a license has been found to be part of a foreign curry puff syndicate. We kid you not.
40-year-old Indonesian national Robiah Lia Caniago was recently fined $3,000 for operating a food business without a license, making curry puffs from her home and selling them to hawker centres. Being a single mother to two toddlers, as well as her husband being in prison and all, she couldn’t afford to pay the fine and served a five-day stint in jail instead.
Obviously, netizen vigilantes think she received such a heavy-handed penalty for making ends meet for her family.
Details released by the National Environment Agency (NEA), however, revealed a nefarious filling underneath her crusty crime.
Robiah was the leader of a dastardly curry puff syndicate, of which the NEA have been in hot, steamy pursuit. Think Walter White if he was a culinary expert instead of a meth empire lord.
Her offences came to light when the agency received complaints about curry puffs being prepared in bulk for sale in her two-room flat. An inspection at her house carried out by NEA officers last year uncovered a literal curry puff lab and assembly line — complete with eight other folks on social visit passes — producing at least 200 curry puffs a day.
Her helpers would then become curry puff runners across various locations in Singapore, hawking their wares illegally in places including MRT stations.
Robiah had carried on operating the curry puff factory despite warnings by the NEA, and they charged her in court for operating a food establishment without a licence.
Like all syndicate lords, she had a partner who funded the initial operating costs. Robiah had met a man in 2013 who offered to go into business with her when her curry puffs started becoming a hit at hawker centres.
The mysterious investor even bought cooking pots and pans for her kitchen, and with the expanded gear Robiah went on an aggressive expansion of manpower with the eight other helpers.
In court, Robiah claimed that the man who helped her died of a massive heart attack, The New Paper reports. OR DID SHE MAKE HIM DISAPPEAR DUE TO HER HUNGER FOR POWER?
Though her curry puffs were a hit, the NEA revealed that they were made in pretty unhygienic conditions. The curry puffs were crafted on a mat on the floor, while the frying pot itself was situated next to the rubbish chute.
The NEA stressed that her operation had to be shut down due to their tough stance against food operators who run unlicensed operations as they could very well flout hygiene regulations and pose a serious threat to public health.
Robiah has since been released from jail, and has since expressed that she wants to put the whole thing behind her and move on. We bid you well, karipap Heisenberg.
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