A SRI LANKAN woman who successfully used her aunt's passport to enter and leave Singapore, only to be nabbed later in Hong Kong, was jailed yesterday.

Jeevanantham Mangaleena was handed a one-year jail term along with her uncle, Ponnambalam Ratnasababathy, who gave the 26-year-old a Canadian passport.

Mangaleena used the document to slip into the country at the Tuas checkpoint on April 13, the court heard. She spent three days in Singapore before hopping on a flight to Hong Kong.

It was only in Hong Kong that an unusually vigilant crew member realised she was using someone else's passport. She was later deported to Singapore.

Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) prosecutor Ronnie Tan said that Ratnasababathy and his wife,
both Canadian citizens, agreed last November to help Mangaleena travel from Sri Lanka to Canada via stops in Singapore and Hong Kong.

Defence lawyer Adrian Wee said Mangaleena had been a target of several kidnapping attempts following the death of her father at the hands of Sri Lankan militia.

On April 13, she and the 47-year-old Ratnasababathy arrived at the Tuas checkpoint after taking a bus from Kuala Lumpur.

Mangaleena then presented her 41-year-old aunt's passport. She had used her own passport to fly to Kuala Lumpur from Singapore the previous day after having stayed here for five days.

A Tuas ICA officer gave her a social visit pass. She used the Canadian passport to fly out of Changi Airport on April 16.

Mr Wee said Ratnasbabathy's wife wanted her niece to go to Canada because of the danger Mangaleena faced in Sri Lanka.

He said Ratnasababathy had paid a ransom on two occasions to free Mangaleena after she had been kidnapped.

Both could have been fined up to $10,000 and jailed for up to 10 years under the Passports Act.

This article was first published in The Straits Times on July 25, 2008.