Authorities arrest Filipino fugitive accused of running a $67 million investment scam

Authorities on Indonesia’s tourist island of Bali arrested a Filipino fugitive accused of helping scam over $67 million out of clients in the Philippines, officials said yesterday.

Hector Aldwin Pantollana, 35, widely known in the Philippines as a casino junket operator, was arrested on Nov. 9 when an automatic gate at immigration in I Gusti Ngurah Rai international airport in Bali identified him as a wanted person using biometric data, said Saffar M. Godam, the acting Director General of immigration at Indonesia’s Immigration and Correctional Ministry.

He said Pantollana first arrived in Bali on Oct. 10, and on Oct. 31 Interpol released a so-called Red Notice for him, a request to law enforcement agencies worldwide to detain or arrest a suspect wanted by a specific country.

Indonesian authorities brought the suspect to Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta, for further investigation and will deport Pantollana to the Philippines on Wednesday, Godam said.

Indonesia’s National Central Bureau Interpol chief Untung Widyatmoko said Pantollana was named as a suspect by the Philippines’ national police after he allegedly collected more than 4 billion Philippine pesos ($67.7 million) from thousands of people for fake investments.

Widyatmoko lauded cooperation between immigration and the national police for capturing foreign criminals who have tried to hide in Indonesia.

“This collaboration aims to make the ASEAN region an area free from transnational crime and criminal hiding,” Widyatmoko said.

Indonesia, an archipelago nation on the crossroads between Asia and the South Pacific, is attractive to local, regional and global organized crime because of its geographical location and its multi-cultural society.

Last month, Indonesia’s immigration officers in Bali arrested a Chinese suspect sought by Beijing for helping to run investment scams that brought in over $14 billion from clients in China.

Indonesian authorities in September arrested Alice Guo, a fugitive former mayor of a town in the Philippine accused of having links to Chinese criminal syndicates. She has since been deported to the Philippines.

In June, Chaowalit Thongduang, one of Thailand’s most wanted fugitives, was escorted back to Thailand on a Thai air force plane after being arrested in Bali following months on the run over allegations he was involved in several killings and drug trafficking. MDT/AP