RP police arrest 23 in securities fraud case
RP police arrest 23 in securities fraud case
MANILA (AP): Police arrested 23 people on Tuesday, including eight foreigners, allegedly involved in a securities fraud, the second such group to be busted in a month.
Police and agents from the immigration bureau and the Securities and Exchange Commission raided an office where the group operated in Manila's financial district of Makati city, said Chief Superintendent Nestorio Gualberto, head of the national police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group.
Gualberto said the group, which includes Americans, Canadians and Britons, allegedly sold non-existing stocks. He gave no other details.
Jose Gutierrez, chief of the southern police district office, said the arrests of the officers and staff of the Goldberg and Partners Inc. followed six months of surveillance.
Gualberto said the group was engaged in a "boiler room" operation similar to another one busted July 11, the Evergreen Consulting Corp/AEC Ventures Inc., which had been in business for a year, selling financial instruments using high-pressure telephone tactics.
Police then arrested one Filipino and 14 foreigners, including Americans, Britons, a Canadian and an Australian.
The National Bureau of Investigation said it estimates there are about 150 "boiler rooms" operating in the Philippines.
In February, police raided another boiler room, also in Makati, arresting 14 foreigners on suspected fraudulent stock sales.
The identities of those arrested Tuesday were not immediately released by police.
In a related development in Bangkok, at least 63 of the 80 foreigners arrested in raids last week on "boiler room" stock trading companies would be deported Tuesday, a senior Thailand immigration officer said.
Most of the others are expected to be deported from Thailand within a few days, police Lt. Col. Thira Osathanond of the Immigration Department said.
Police last Thursday raided two securities firms allegedly involved in stock fraud - the Brinton Group and Benson Dupont Capital Management.
The Australian and Irish bosses of the two firms were still in detention. Police have said they would be charged with setting up an illegal securities firm and face up to five years in jail.
Seventy-eight lower-level employees have been fined for working without work permits. They allegedly made high-pressure sales pitches over the phone to convince would-be investors in Australia and New Zealand to purchase shares in shaky or nonexistent companies.
Police couldn't give full details about the nationalities of the foreigners to be deported Tuesday.
Those fined for working without permits included 8 Americans, 32 Britons, 5 Canadians, 10 Irish, 9 Australians, 6 Filipinos, 2 Singaporeans, a New Zealander, a Malaysian, a Spaniard, an Indian, a Myanmar citizen and a Jamaican.
Thai authorities have warned that 21 other "boiler room" companies are operating in Bangkok. Such scams have reportedly drifted from America and Europe into Asia and were now operating in Thailand, the Philippines and Hong Kong.