Police earlier today arrested six members of an alleged kidnap-for-ransom gang that targeted foreign high rollers at Manila casinos.
According to police reports, the group would befriend foreigners on a losing streak, then offer them loans. Those who unable to repay the “loans,” would be kidnapped and locked in a house the group used for that purpose.
Director Glenn Dumlao of the Philippine National Police Anti-Kidnapping Group said the Korean Embassy first put them on their track when a Korean was reported missing while playing at a casino hotel in Malate, Manila.
Authorities tracked the kidnapped Korean national, Yeum Sunki, to a house in Bulacan province just north of Metro Manila.
Dumlao told reporters they were surprised to find not only the missing Korean, but two other foreign nationals being detained inside the compound. They were identified as Park Panho, also a Korean, and an unidentified Chinese woman.
Both had allegedly been held in the house for at least 30 days after they had been unable to repay their kidnappers.
The owner of the house was identified as one of the six men arrested: Ernesto Agsulid Marella.
Police identified the other suspects as Alexander Dionisio, Jomar Dela Peña, Raymond De Guzman, Ferdie Dionisio and Florida Dionisio.
According to a report in Inquirer.net in July, Philippine National Police Director Ronald Dela Rosa said police were pursuing a “loan-sharking” kidnapping group that operated with a similar modus of offering “loans ” to foreigners and detaining them if they couldn’t pay.
However, police officials did not say if the group arrested today is the same one Dela Rosa had referred to.
Marella, the homeowner, allegedly told police their victims “agreed to be detained” and signed a contract agreeing to the detention until they were able to pay their debts, apparently unaware that it’s illegal for anyone other than the police or government authorities to detain anyone.
Last July, police arrested 44 Chinese nationals for allegedly kidnapping, detaining and beating up a Singaporean woman who was gambling at the Solaire Casino in Manila. Thirty of the 44 were later cleared by police and released.
READ: 30 foreigners cleared in kidnapping of Singaporean woman in Manila
The suspects in this case are all Filipinos, and face charges of kidnapping for ransom and illegal detention.
with reports from ABS-CBN News
