Victims attracted by cheap sex

Japanese, Korean and European tourists are "favorite" targets of the dreaded Ativan Gang of robbers in the city of Manila, the director of the Western Police District said.

According to Chief Superintendent Nicolas Pasinos, members of the robbery gang find Japanese, Koreans and Europeans easy prey as they are more trusting of strangers and are easily attracted by the cheap sex offered by the gang.

"They (victims) think they have struck it big when a young and sexy girl offers them cheap sex. They don’t know that it is just a ploy to gain their trust and then rob them later," said Pasinos.

The Ativan Gang usually includes as its members, young girls who serve as "bait" tasked to befriend the target or targets. The gang usually hangs around shopping malls in the Manila tourist belt and in other areas where foreign men can be found.

Once they spot their target, the young girls of the gang approach and befriend him. The girls, clad in sexy attire, ask the victim to go somewhere with them, usually a house where they promise to have sex with him.

Hooked, the victim or victims are accompanied by the girls to a waiting car that supposedly would take them to the house. Along the way, the girls make their victims drink softdrinks or juice spiked with the drug Ativan, a strong sedative that soon knocks them out. Once unconscious, the other gang members divest the victims of their cash and valuables and later dump them.

According to Pasinos, Americans and Chinese tourists are least victimized by the Ativan Gang as they are distrustful of strangers and have been thoroughly briefed about the scam prior to their arrival in the country.

Recently, two Japanese executives, a Korean businessman and a French cattle breeder where victimized by alleged members of the Ativan Gang.

Two of the victims were identified by police as Japanese Shuhel Uchida, a rolling stock engineer of the Metro Manila Light Railway Transit Authority (LRTA); and Frenchman Michel Hennequin, 53, cattle breeder and temporarily residing at Unit 2610 of Prime Town Century Tower, Makati City.

Uchida pointed to a certain Roberto Sambili as the one who approached him somewhere in Makati City last Sunday. Sambili, who allegedly knows how to speak Japanese, sought the victim’s help after his vehicle stalled.

Reports said the suspect then befriended Uchida before he was shoved into an unknown type of vehicle. Uchida said he was fortunate because he was dropped off by the suspects in Makati City after taking his P1,000. The other Japanese victim, who was not immediately identified, was also said to have been victimized by the same group last Monday.

Also recently victimized by the Ativan Gang was South Korean diplomat Chung Young Ho. The victim, the Third Secretary of the South Korean Embassy, was drugged by the gang somewhere in the Makati City business district and was found dead in a morgue last Monday in Marikina City. – Mike Frialde