More on the trail of the stolen Bangladeshi funds
Kam Sin Wong, a Chinese junket operator who testified before the Philippine Senate revealed the names of a Beijing resident and a Macau resident who may be key in the case.
The Philippines.- Kam Sin Wong, a Chinese junket operator who testified at the hearing before the Philippine Senate Blue Ribbon Committee said that US$81 million were remitted by two casino junket agents and gamblers: Beijing resident Gao Shuhua and Macau resident named Ding Zhize.
Weeks ago, about US$81 million of Bangladesh’s stolen funds were transferred online to four private accounts at a branch of the Rizal Commercial Banking Corp in the Philippines. The funds were allegedly stolen by cyber criminals from the Bangladesh central bank’s account in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. A part of these funds ended up in the Solaire Resort and Casino and in the Midas Hotel casino.
The US$81 million were transferred to five accounts created with fictitious names at a branch of the Rizal Commercial Banking Corp., consolidated and then sent to the casinos and junket operators through Philrem. Wong said Maia Deguito, the bank branch manager and Gao met in May in his office to discuss opening the accounts for a big amount of money that would be brought in and invested by Gao. The witness claims he had no role in the fake paperwork, which according to his testimony was arranged by Deguito.
Wong affirms that about US$7.8 million remains in Philippine casinos and may still be recovered. Wong himself volunteered to return US$4.63 million that remains in a junket account in Solaire Resort and Casino and 40 million pesos (US$863,000) that still remains in Midas Hotel casino under the account of his company, Eastern Hawaii Leisure Co. Silverio Benny Tan, corporate secretary of Solaire’s operator, Bloomberry Resorts Corp., said during the hearing that the casino has frozen 108.67 million pesos (US$2.33 million) worth of chips and money in different denominations it confiscated from the gamblers when the bank heist issue became known.
Wong added that US$17 million are still in the remittance company Philrem, however the company owners denied the allegation during the hearing. Wong also said that Gao paid him 450 million pesos (US$9.71 million) for a loan that covered Gao’s losses in an earlier gambling spree in the country, then US$370,000 in cash were withdrawn by the casino junket agents in violation of their agreement that all the money would remain in the casino accounts.
On the other hand, Bangladesh turned over to the committee a list of 30 other suspicious transactions that the Federal Reserve Bank of New York did not execute, which showed that another US$850 million would have been transferred to the fake accounts in the Philippine bank had those transfers not been stopped beforehand.
