MANILA, Philippines – Listed Filipino owners of the shady Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs) in Bamban, Tarlac have turned themselves in to authorities even as they claimed that their signatures were either forged, or they were at the very least misled, in the operations of the hubs that allegedly trafficked, tortured, and scammed victims.
For Hongsheng Gaming Technology Incorporated (Hongsheng) — the first iteration of the POGO in Bamban that rented the compound of Alice Guo’s Baofu — incorporators Rita Yturralde, Rowena Evangelista and Thelma Laranan surrendered to the NBI after they were included in the Pasig Regional Trial Court (RTC) order for the issuance of warrants for the non-bailable charge of human trafficking. Their defense is that they are just vendors incapable of running a POGO, and whose modest houses were previously shown in a Senate hearing.
For Yun Zuan Technology — the second POGO whom authorities accused Hongsheng of just renaming — the two incorporators Roderick Pujante and Juan Miguel Alpas also surrendered, claiming they were misled by another Filipino who had the direct contact to Guo.
“Maaaring ganun nga at ‘yan ay dapat maipaliwanag nila sa hukuman. Kasi as far as investigation is concerned, sila ang mga official ng mga corporations na ito na aming imbestigahan. Pagdating nila sa korte, dun nila sasabihin sa korte, bahala na ang korte kung ia-appreciate nila ang kanilang testimonies,” said NBI Director Jaime Santiago in a press conference on Monday, September 23.
(That could be the case, and they should just explain to the court. Because as far as our investigation is concerned, they are the officials of the corporations we are investigating. When they face the court, that’s where they’ll tell the court and it’s up to the court if it would appreciate their testimonies.)
‘They stole our data from lending companies’
Based on Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) documents, Laranan, Evangelista and Yturralde are among the five incorporators of Hongsheng Gaming Technology, the POGO in Bamban.
The other listed incorporator of Hongsheng, Merlie Joy Castro, previously appeared in a Senate investigation saying she is a mere vendor-turned-Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) worker and claimed she had no knowledge of the POGO. Castro said she knows Laranan, Evangelista and Yturralde because she has also bought goods from them in the wet market.
Laranan, Evangelista and Yturralde told the Department of Justice (DOJ) during preliminary investigation that their identities must have been stolen from lending companies, as they often borrow to make ends meet.
“Their economic situation would clearly show their financial incapacity to invest in Hongsheng Gaming. In fact, most of the time, said respondents are constrained to borrow money from different lending companies,” the three women claimed, according to the prosecutors’ resolution that included them in the charges.
Yturralde also claimed that the Tax Identification Number (TIN) that appears in Hongsheng Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) documents was not hers, and that Laranan and Evangelista do not even have TINs “as they have never been employed in any company,” said the resolution.
Without specifying why they were not convinced of the three women’s claims, the prosecutors said “the key positions held by respondents Guo, Zhang, Lin, Carreon, Huang, Laranan, Evangelista, Yturralde, Castro, Can, Cruz, Pujante and Alpas in Baofu, Hongsheng Gaming and Yun Zuan Technology are integral for the organization of the said corporations.”
“The incorporation of Baofu, Hongsheng Gaming and Yun Zuan Technology could not have been made possible without their participation to make it appear under Philippine Laws that the purpose of its incorporation is for a legitimate purpose,” said the resolution.
The same resolution did not mention Laranan, Evangelista, Yturralde and Castro when it said that, “There exists prima facie evidence with reasonable certainty of conviction to indict respondents Guo, Huang, Carreon, Zhang, Lin, Yu, Cunanan, Cruz, Pujante, and Alpas.” Still, they were included in the recommendation for charges, and in the Pasig court’s order for warrants.
DOJ Undersecretary Nicholas Ty, head of the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT), told Rappler: “Their defense was mere denial which was unsubstantiated.”
“There is evidence that the modus operandi of the Bamban POGO is to get individuals to front for them as incorporators, etc. in exchange for financial consideration,” said Ty.
The fifth and last incorporator of Hongsheng — the only non-Filipino — is Yu Zheng Can, who is Chinese. The Anti-Money Laundering Council found a joint bank account of Can and Hongjiang Yang, a brother of Rodrigo Duterte’s former presidential economic adviser to Michael Yang. This bank account had been frozen by the Court of Appeals.
Links to the Chinese ‘bosses’
In the money laundering complaint filed by investigators against the same people in the Bamban POGO, Laranan was named as an occupant of the POGO’s office in the compound, together with Can and Huang Zhiyang. Huang Zhiyang is also an incorporator of Baofu and remained to be an officer of the company even after Guo’s alleged divestment (investigators believe this was a fake divestment), and he is believed to be the “boss of all POGOs.”
Laranan, Yu Zheng Can, and Huang Zhiyang faced a separate complaint for violations of the Securities Code when Hongsheng was raided in early 2023, and in that indictment, the employees claimed that “the officers, owners and operators thereat required them to employ schemes to defraud unsuspecting victims.”
It’s also Laranan who appears in more documents for Hongsheng, including a letter to former Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor) chair Andrea Domingo in September 2020 assigning former government official Dennis Cunanan to be Hongsheng’s authorized representative to regulators. Cunanan was also the government liaison for the Lucky South 99 POGO in Porac, Pampanga.
Cunanan was also charged and ordered arrested in this trafficking case.
Most of the Chinese ordered arrested are still at large. “Hindi kami tumitigil sa paghahanap sa kanila (We continue to look for them),” said Santiago.
Filipinos vs Filipinos
Guo’s co-incorporator in Baofu, Rachelle Joan Malonzo Carreon, and the incorporators of Zun Yuan (supposedly the succeeding name of Hongsheng after it was raided) — Jamielyn Santos Cruz, Pujante, and Alpas — also surrendered to the NBI. They are all likewise charged and ordered arrested by the Pasig Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 167.
Cruz, who identified herself as a host for state-run PTV, admitted she really did invest in the Zun Yuan POGO after she was offered to do so. Cruz said she met Guo through a tourism segment that they did in Bamban, but that it was not Guo who asked her to invest. Cruz told the DOJ during the preliminary investigation that she “admits [she is] the incorporator of Zun Yuan Technology but denies having any hand or involvement in the operations of the corporation.”
During the NBI press conference, Cruz said: “Wala pong trafficking na nangyayari dito, dahil lahat po ito ay allegations pa lamang, they have to prove it in court. Kaso dahil masyado na pong high-profile ang nangyayari, parang lahat po kami kasama ako ay masasamang tao at criminals. Sisiguraduhin ko po na hindi po ito totoo, kaming mga Pilipino.”
(There’s no trafficking that happens here because all of it are just allegations, and they have to prove it in court. But because this case is already very high-profile, it’s as if all of us here are bad people and criminals. I will make sure these are disproven, for us Filipinos.)
But Cruz’s co-incorporators, Pujante and Alpas, both Filipinos, pointed to Cruz and her brother. The two spoke in the press conference but did not identify themselves. One of them said Cruz’s brother, who is married to Guo’s chief-of-staff, was the one who asked them to sign papers. “Ginamit lang po kami dito..Papatunayan namin, mag-eexplain po kami sa court, para malinis po namin ang pangalan namin at takot na takot na po kami sa seguridad namin. Alam naman po nating hindi po biro ang mga nasa likod nito,” said one of the male incorporators.
(We were used here. We will prove it, we will explain it to the court, so we can clear our names because we are very scared for our security. We know that the people behind this are no joke.)
Cruz said, in reaction: “Siya po ay pumirma, inalok din po sila dito para mag-invest. Sila po ay nakakabasa, nakakasulat, nag-aral, siguro sa korte na lang po.” (He signed, they were offered to invest. They can read, they can write, they are educated, I’ll just explain it to the court.)
The male incorporators said they preferred to stay in the NBI’s custody. Santiago said they will coordinate with the Pasig court to discuss the request.
Guo was transferred to the Pasig City Jail Female Dormitory on Monday, following the court’s commitment order. – Rappler.com
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