2 ‘pork’ scam suspects slip out of PH

MANILA, Philippines–Two of the more than 50 people facing plunder and graft charges for allegedly being involved in the “pork” barrel scandal have slipped out of the country, the Bureau of Immigration said Friday.

Immigration spokesperson Elaine Tan said former Technology Resource Center (TRC) director general Antonio Ortiz and Renato Ornopia left the country prior to the issuance of the hold departure order by the Sandiganbayan earlier this week.

Travel records of Ortiz and Ornopia were extracted from the BI database based on available information, particularly names stated in the HDO, and “internal information,” she said.

Ortiz left for San Francisco, California, on September 6, 2013.

But Tan said the list was not yet final as the agency was  “triple-checking” its system to ensure that the names of those on the immigration list  are the same  persons in the agency’s records.

“As the names itself are not sufficient to fully identify the person being checked, only half of the records have been determined to refer to the accused with certainty,” she said.

The immigration bureau, she said, is still requesting for more information from  the Sandiganbayan as some records do not have date of birth, middle name, or that the accused may have a different name in the passport.

For instance, Tan said the name of Senator Estrada in his passport is “Jinggoy Ejercito Estrada” while the HDO is issued against “Jose Ejercito Estrada”.

“This may be the reason why some of the accused have zero travel records,” she said.

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