Casino junket operator Kim Wong has returned to the Philippines authorities another US$4.34m (200 million pesos), part of the US$81million stolen from the Bangladesh Bank reserves in one of the world's biggest cyber heists.BB Reserves Heist
Wong returns $4.34m more
Deguito admits lying at Senate body hearing
Mamun Abdullah from Manila
Casino junket operator Kim Wong has returned to the Philippines authorities another US$4.34m (200 million pesos), part of the US$81million stolen from the Bangladesh Bank reserves in one of the worlds biggest cyber heists.
Meanwhile, Maia Santos-Deguito, the former branch manager of Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC), has admitted lying to the Senate committee to hide the people involved in the $81 million money laundering scheme. The Philippine Anti-Money Laundering Councils (AMLC) Executive Director Julia Bacay-Abad told a Senate inquiry yesterday that Wongs company, Eastern Hawaii Leisure Co. Ltd., turned over the sum of 200 million pesos through its lawyer to AMLC for safekeeping on Monday. Casino boss Wong had earlier returned about US$5.5 million out of some US$35 million stolen money that he had received through his casino company and Philrem, the foreign exchange broker. Wong also told the Senate committee hearing that it was part of the 450 million pesos that he had promised to return if proven that the money was part of the stolen funds from Bangladesh Bank.
During an earlier Senate committee hearing, Wong had claimed that a total of $21.7 million (1 billion peso) of the US$81 million funds remitted to Rizal Commercial Banking Corps Makati City branch went to his company. 450 million pesos of which, was debt payment to him by junket operator Shuhua Gao, he had claimed. He said the remaining 550 million peso was converted into chips and played in the casino, and only more than 40 million peso of the amount was left. Meanwhile at the Senate blue ribbon committee hearing yesterday, Deguito said casino junket operator Kim Wong instructed her to transfer the money from the accounts of four depositors to the account of Centurytex Trading owned by William Go. Deguito said it was Wong, who referred the four account holders and that the junket operator acted as their authorized representatives to inquire balances and instruct me for further instructions. However, RCBCs legal chief Maria Celia Estavillo contradicted Deguitos claim and said there are no documents to support what shes saying. The legal chief also pointed out that Deguito had categorically told the RCBC office that it was Mr. Lagrosas who gave her instructions on the transfer of funds to Mr. William Go.
When the committee asked Deguito why she she gave a different statement to the bank, Deguito replied that at that time she was not prepared to reveal the identities of the referrals of the accounts and the people involved, so her lawyer advised her to inform that Mr. Lagrosas gave the transfer instructions. Meanwhile, officials at the Bangladesh Embassy in the Philippines said the money stolen from the central bank reserves can only be brought back to the country by following due legal procedures. If the stolen money was deposited to the embassy account, it would have been easier to bring back the money, they said. Bangladesh Ambassador to the Philippines John Gomes said the Philippines government is extending all out cooperation to recover and return the money to Bangladesh. Meanwhile, the CID of police in Bangladesh said a total of 20 people were identified to be involved in the stealing of $101 million from the central bank reserves. Twelve of them are nationals of the Philippines while the other 8 are Sri Lankan, said officials. Unidentified hackers stole the money from the Bangladesh Banks account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in early February and funneled part of it through a Manila branch of the Rizal Commercial Banking Corp (RCBC) to casinos and gambling agents in the Philippines.
