CA extends freeze on oil firm’s assets

The Court of Appeals (CA)  has extended its freeze order on the bank accounts and other assets of an oil company, two of its officials and a customs employee who were sued by the Bureau of Customs (BOC) for allegedly smuggling into the country over P8 billion worth of oil products.

In a resolution, the appellate court extended the 20-day freeze order it had earlier issued on the bank deposits and properties of Cross Country Oil and Petroleum Corp. to six months.

It covered the respondents’ various bank accounts in Asia United Bank, Security Bank, Metrobank, Bank of the Philippine Islands, Banco de Oro, Green Bank, Land Bank, Philippine National Bank and Export and Industry Bank.

The seven-page freeze order, written by Associate Justice Michael Elbinias, also covered the assets of Cross Country stockholder Aleli Arellano, its representative Samuel Mora and BOC employee Jerome Canada, who was accused of facilitating the release of Cross Country’s supposed smuggled oil products.

In granting the petition of the Anti-Money Laundering Council, the appellate court dismissed the respondents’ contention that the AMLC’s motion involved a prejudicial question since the criminal complaint against them was still pending in the Department of Justice.

But the court said the petition for the issuance of a freeze order was an “extraordinary provisional relief which the AMLC may avail of to effectively combat and prosecute money laundering offenses.”

It also threw out Cross Country et al.’s defense that the AMLC violated the Bank Secrecy Act and that it failed to prove that the bank accounts contained the money generated from their purported smuggling activities.

“Defeating respondents’ arguments that petitioner violated the Bank Secrecy Act is that… the information on the accounts stated in the petition was obtained from the data available to it and from the date required of banks to provide AMLC with,” the court said. Marlon Ramos