Hello and welcome to the details of Chinese woman who faked nationality to become Philippines mayor jailed for human trafficking and now with the details
Nevin Al Sukari - Sana'a - This file picture shows former mayor of Bamban in Philippines’ Tarlac province, Alice Guo, attending a hearing at the Senate in Manila over accusations of human trafficking and links to Chinese organised crime, on September 9, 2024. — AFP pic
MANILA, Nov 20 — A Philippine court today sentenced Alice Guo, a Chinese national who became a mayor while masquerading as a Filipina, and seven others to life in prison on human trafficking charges, state prosecutors said.
Guo, who served as mayor of a town north of Manila, was found guilty of overseeing a Chinese-operated online gambling centre where hundreds of people were forced to run scams or risk torture.
The sprawling complex, which included office buildings, luxury villas and a large swimming pool, was raided in March 2024 after a Vietnamese worker escaped and called police.
More than 700 Filipinos, Chinese, Vietnamese, Malaysians, Taiwanese, Indonesians and Rwandans were found on site, along with documents allegedly showing that Guo was president of a company that owned the compound.
All eight defendants, some of whom were foreign nationals, were sentenced to life in prison, state prosecutor Olivia Torrevillas said outside a regional courthouse in Manila.
“After over just one year, the court... gave us a favourable decision. Alice (Guo) was convicted along with seven other co-accused. Life imprisonment,” Torrevillas said, declining to name Guo’s co-defendants due to a confidentiality law.
A spokesman for the Philippine Anti-Organized Crime Commission told reporters in a group chat that Guo and three others had been convicted of “organising trafficking” inside the compound.
Four more were found guilty of “acts of trafficking”, the spokesman said.
Guo, 35, was arrested by Indonesian police in September 2024 after fleeing the Philippines.
Although she was elected mayor of Bamban town, the site of the scam centre, a Manila court ruled in June that as a Chinese citizen Guo was never eligible for the position.
The Chinese embassy today did not immediately return calls seeking comment.
The transnational scam industry has ballooned in Southeast Asia in recent years, with thousands of scammers estimated to be involved.
Victims in the wider region were conned out of up to US$37 billion in 2023, according to a UN report, which said global losses were likely “much larger”.
The centres flourished in the Philippines under former president Rodrigo Duterte after the government regulator was given the right to issue operating licences nationwide.
President Ferdinand Marcos announced a ban on offshore gambling operations amid mounting public fury over the Guo case in 2024, ordering foreign nationals working at the sites out of the country. — AFP
These were the details of the news Chinese woman who faked nationality to become Philippines mayor jailed for human trafficking for this day. We hope that we have succeeded by giving you the full details and information. To follow all our news, you can subscribe to the alerts system or to one of our different systems to provide you with all that is new.
It is also worth noting that the original news has been published and is available at Malay Mail and the editorial team at AlKhaleej Today has confirmed it and it has been modified, and it may have been completely transferred or quoted from it and you can read and follow this news from its main source.
