City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee was convicted in 2015 of misappropriating S$50 million in church funds, some S$24 million of it funnelled through sham bonds to bankroll his wife Sun Ho's pop music career.
The case began quietly in May 2010, when the Commercial Affairs Department started investigating one of Singapore's largest and most glamorous megachurches, known for its electrifying Sunday services and its preaching of a prosperity gospel blending spiritual and material aspiration. What followed was one of the longest criminal trials in the country's history, spanning 140 days.
On October 21, 2015, Kong and five other church leaders were found guilty of criminal breach of trust. The court found that about S$24 million had been invested in sham bonds issued by church-linked entities to finance the Crossover Project, an ambitious bid to turn Kong's wife Ho Yeow Sun, better known as Mandopop singer Sun Ho, into an international star as a vehicle for evangelism. A further S$26 million was then used in a series of round-tripping transactions to cover their tracks. One of the trial judges later called the Crossover Project a very extravagant means of spreading the gospel.
Kong, seen by the court as the key man guiding his five accomplices, was originally sentenced to eight years in jail. On appeal in April 2017, the High Court substituted the original charges with a less serious offence and cut his term to three and a half years. The prosecution's bid to reinstate the heavier sentences was rejected by the Court of Appeal in February 2018, ending nearly five years of legal battles. Kong surrendered himself in April 2017 and walked free from Changi Prison on August 22, 2019, a day before his 55th birthday, after remission for good behaviour.
Notably, the court observed that the S$50 million was ultimately returned to the church through the sham transactions, meaning the congregation suffered no permanent financial loss, a factor that weighed in the sentencing. Even so, the case was unprecedented as the largest misuse of charitable funds in Singapore's history.
The saga gripped a city-state with little tolerance for corruption and almost no precedent for fraud mixed with faith. It sparked a national conversation about the governance of religious organisations and financial accountability in charities, and it permanently altered the public image of a pastor who had once filled stadiums.
The case also prompted charities and religious organisations across Singapore to tighten their governance, with regulators reminding the sector that donor money demands the highest standards of stewardship. Kong has since kept a low public profile, while the church continues to operate.