Gambler ‘cheats’ e-bingo machine but not manager

A 28-year-old man was arrested on Thursday afternoon for allegedly using some P11,500 in counterfeit bills at an electronic gambling station in Manila.

Sencon Sabidin of Taguig City was caught carrying 23 pieces of fake P500 bills, one of which he had used undetected to play an e-bingo machine. He claimed he got the bills from a friend in Quiapo, Manila.

Supt. Ferdinand Quirante of the Manila Police District (MPD) Meisic station 11 said Sabidin was first accosted at around 4:30 p.m. by security officers of the New Divisoria Mall Bingo Center on the third floor of the Divisoria Mall along Sto. Cristo Street in Binondo.

He was later turned over to the police.

Quirante said that before the arrest, Sabidin was playing one of the e-bingo machines when the manager, Christopher Diaz, asked him to move to another since it was time to take the cash out of that particular unit.

Diaz immediately noticed a fake P500 bill on top of the wads of cash he got from the machine. “He (Diaz) became suspicious of Sabidin since he was the last person who used it,” Quirante said.

When questioned at the administrative office, Sabidin yielded 22 more pieces of fake peso bills bearing four similar serial numbers, prompting Diaz to report him to the MPD station, the officer said.