Manila: State prosecutors and the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) legal officers have secured the conviction of a compliance officer charged under Republic Act (RA) 9160, or the AML Act of 2001, for his role in the 2016 Bangladesh Bank heist, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said Thursday. In a news release, the DOJ said Anthony Pelejo, as a compliance officer of Philrem Service Corp., 'failed to keep records as mandated by law.'
According to Philippines News Agency, Philrem is a remittance agent duly registered with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and is a covered institution under RA 9160. The DOJ said the BSP received in 2016 a request from the Governor of Bangladesh Bank to investigate several unauthorized payment instructions totaling USD81 million directed to Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC).
The investigation showed that USD80.88 million was deposited into the RCBC bank account of William So Go, doing business under the name Centurytex Trading. 'Go made several fund transfers to the RCBC bank account of Philrem Service Corporation (PHILREM), and the latter further made several transfers to Bloomberry Resorts and Hotels, Inc. (Solaire), Eastern Hawaii Leisure Company, and Wei Kang Xu,' the DOJ said.
Under RA 9160, covered institutions, such as Philrem, are required to maintain and store records of all transactions, including customer identification documents, for five years from the date of the transaction. 'The law does not provide for any exception relieving covered institutions of their obligation to maintain and store records on the ground that such information may be available with other banks or financial institutions. Philrem's failure to maintain customer identification records constitutes a clear violation of law,' the DOJ said.
The law provides a penalty of imprisonment of six months to one year, or a fine of not less than PHP100,000 but not more than PHP500,000, or both. This conviction, the DOJ said, is a first in Philippine law, where a compliance officer violated the mandatory record-keeping of a covered institution. 'Section 9 of RA 9160 mandates that covered institutions maintain client records for at least five (5) years and report covered or suspicious transactions to the Anti-Money Laundering Council. It requires strict customer identification (KYC) and imposes penalties for failure to keep records or for breaches of confidentiality,' it added.
