The Bureau of Customs (BOC) unrelenting campaign to file cases against suspected smugglers and to eventually put them behind bars has once again placed 11 people, seven (7) of them officers of a Cebu based Freight service company, two (2) customs brokers, a port dispatcher and a warehouse owner in hot water after they were all charged for their failed attempt to smuggle 10 twenty footer container vans of smuggled sugar from Thailand worth Php 10 million at the Port of Cebu on November 22, 2012.
The hot sugar seize was facilitated by operatives of the BOCs Enforcement and Security Service at the Port of Cebu.
As he held other Customs officials in the filing of the BOCs 128th case during his 18 months term in office today (April 25, 2013) at the Department of Justice, Biazon said, the officials of the smuggled sugars consignee Calorama Freight Services, Inc. led by its President Judith Escuadro, Directors Democrito Rama, Carolina Q. Rama, Christine Q. Rama, Fatima R. Qui, Emeline E. Archival and Shiela Cecilia E. Ignacio, together with customs brokers Junrey Arreglo and Tita D. Austria, Port dispatcher Rodilin Solidarios and warehouse owner Jesse Yu, are all being charged for violation of Serious 3601 and 3602, in relation to Sections 2503 and 2530 of the Tariffs and Customs Code of the Philippines, and also in relation to the sugar Regulatory Administration Rules and Procedures when they misdeclared five of the 10 twenty footer container vans of illegally imported sugar as marble and granite products and the other five container vans as plastic parts for eye glasses to avoid the required importation permit for the Sugar Regulatory Authority.
Smuggling is really a serious menace to society. It takes away local jobs and business, as well as ruin families and lives. And so long as smugglers still lurk in the Customs industry, this social and economic menace could be far from over. Biazon said.
We are hoping, therefore, for the speedy resolution by the Department of Justice of the case we are filing today, as well as the other cases we have already filed, if only to send the strong message that we are really serious in the fight against smuggling. Biazon added.
For his part, Run-After-The Smugglers (RATS) Head and Deputy Commissioner for Revenue Collection and Monitoring Group (RCMG) Peter Manzano expressed confidence that the BOC would be getting a favorable resolution on the case to be filed today against the 11 suspected sugar smugglers.
We will do our best to get a conviction on this case, as well as the other cases we filed earlier with the DOJ. Manzano said.
