‘Honey love’ scam con artists held in Baguio

BAGUIO CITY -- An entrapment operation resulted to the arrest of two suspects of a “honey love” scam while claiming the money from their victim in a remittance center here at Marcos Highway on May 2. 

    The arrest was made following a complaint from a Service woman of the Philippine Navy residing in Dasmarinas City, Cavite and made possible with the joint efforts of personnel of Manila International Airport Police Department, Regional Anti-Cybercrime Unit – Cordillera and Baguio City Police Office.
    Based on a report from the Legarda Police Station here, the suspects were identified as Williams John Ani, Nigerian National pretending to be Lucas Chan, a civil engineer of South Korea  and   Iindira Geil   Villanueva “Sharon”   Duca,  25,  Filipino,  pretending   to  be  a  Korean service agent.

    Both were residing here at Bengao, Marcos Highway.

    The Nigerian  national posing as  “Lucas”  allegedly deceived  the victim through online “chat” claiming that he sent her a package containing Apple Laptops, I-phone, watch and cash.

Later, the victim received a message saying that the package was already at the airport, but she needed to pay custom clearance amounting to P35,000.

    After she paid the said amount to a certain Analiza Fadriga Ellasos through a bank account,

    Duca posing as agent “Sharon,” asked for another amount of P145,000 to issue a “certificate of money laundering,” as the package was supposedly detected to be containing dollar bills which is illegal.

    The victim was threatened she would be imprisoned if she will not pay the said amount.

    The complainant, already getting suspicious, decided to verify the tracking number of said uggage at the airport and found out that there was no such package sent.

    She was informed it is the typical modus operandi of con artists in “Honey Love” scam using different social media platforms and/or dating apps.

    She continued chatting with the suspects and with the assistance of   airport police, the entrapment operation was successfully conducted.

    The arrested suspects together with the complainant were brought to Chapel Road, NAIA Complex, Pasay City for disposition after a blotter report was done at Legarda Police Station. 

    They are now facing charges of swindling and estafa through online scam in violation of Republic Act 10175 or the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012.

 

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