Oz probes how rich B.C. murderer entered country

The Vancouver Province

A parliamentary committee is investigating South Australian Sen. Nick Bolkus for arranging for the issue of a temporary visa to John Kong Shan Ng even though Bolkus knew Ng was sentenced to six years in jail for killing Camosun College student Larry Lam in 1987. After the murder, Ng dumped Lam's body in the Pacific Ocean and then lied to try to cover up the crime.

Ng was granted permanent Australian residency status last year because his Canadian murder conviction and sentence were not considered when granting the temporary visa, Vancouver's Asian Pacific Post reported.

Ng served 14 months of his sentence in Canada before being deported to Hong Kong.

He later moved to Australia and emerged as a leading businessman with strong political ties.

Now 36, he is director of his family's business, Path Line Australia, an environmental-waste company currently bidding on a multimillion-dollar contract in Adelaide.

Ng's temporary visa was granted in 1996 after three rejections and interventions by Bolkus--Australia's former immigration minister--who noted Ng's family had invested the equivalent of $26.7 million and Ng had not reoffended Down Under other than in running up minor traffic tickets.

Lam, 20, disappeared in June 1987 and the Hong Kong student was considered missing for three months until fraud investigators stumbled on to the murder while probing bad cheques allegedly written by him.

Officers discovered Ng had been using Lam's identity to access his bank account and had applied for a driver's licence and firearms acquisition certificate posing as the dead man. Ng's wealthy parents even helped in the coverup by driving Lam's car to Seattle and dumping it.

Fearing imprisonment, Ng fled to Taiwan. He was finally arrested in April 1991 when--thinking he had gotten away with murder--he returned to Canada for a vacation and was arrested in Duncan.

In court, Ng confessed to shooting Lam in a "drunken rage" and dumping his body off Telegraph Cove. Lam's body was never found.