Staff Reporter :
Casino junket operator Kam Sin Wong, also known as Kim Wong, on Monday surrendered an additional P38.28 million or US$0.83 million to the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) for safekeeping in the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) headquarters in Manila.
The amount was the part of $81 million stolen by hackers from a reserve account of Bangladesh Bank held with the Federal Reserve Bank in New York, according Philippines media reports.
Wong surrendered the amount by his legal counsels Victor Fernandez and Inocencio Ferrer.
Julia Bacay-Abad, AMLC Executive Director, Emmanuel Dooc, AMLC member, Vicente Aquino, Deputy Governor of BSP, Shahnaz Gazi, Chief of Mission of Bangladesh Embassy in Manila and Bangladesh Bank representatives witnessed the turn over.
But the turnover was hit a slight snag when authorities found two fake P500 banknotes amid the mountains of cash.
Later, Wong’s lawyer had to shell out P1,000 to replace the fake banknotes.
Julia Bacay-Abad confirmed that they found two counterfeit bills during the two-hour long counting that started at 11 a.m. and ended 1 p.m.
“All P38.28 million were in denominations of P500 and P1,000,” Bacay-Abad said.
Kim Wong believed to the mastermind of the cross border money-laundering scam earlier surrendered $4.63 million to the AMCL.
His company Eastern Hawaii Leisure Company Ltd (EHLCL) got hold of P1 billion or $21.575 million of the stolen funds.
“We turn over to the central bank exactly $0.83 million or P38.28 million,” Fernandez told reporters after the accounting of the funds by the BSP Cash Department.
He said, this is in addition to the $4.63 million which Wong turned over to AMLC on March 31.
Fernandez said the amount represents the abandoned money of junket player Gao Shu Hua, in EHLCL and or Midas Casino.
The lawyer said it would take 15-30 days to raise some more funds before could return another P450 million that was borrowed by Casino player Gao Shuhua.
According to the BSP, the money will be held for safekeeping by AMLC at the BSP vault.
Wong’s lawyers also locked in a legal argument with AMLC officials over the deposition of the fund.
“We have no mandate to turn it over to the Bangladesh government. Our client, Mr. Kim Wong, has no business directly with the Bangladeshis. Our clear understanding is that after turning over the funds to AMLC ‘for safekeeping’, its disposition should be subject to a government-to-government agreement,” Fernandez stressed.
Earlier, in the morning Fernandez and Ferrer went to the AMLC office to deliver the second tranche of the laundered funds.
