5 Marcos cronies face estafa raps

Five businessmen have been charged with syndicated estafa in court after they tried to sell the historic Luneta Hotel in Manila using a fake title.

Charged were Erlinda Panlilio, Marlo Cristobal, Nicole Morris, Jose Marcel Panlilio and Herminio Valerio.

Prosecutors said the businessmen were associated with the late strongman Ferdinand Marcos.

In a nine-page resolution dated Jan. 19, State Prosecutor Phillip dela Cruz said the circumstances of the case show that all the elements of syndicated estafa are present in the case.

“Records showed that respondents have resorted to at least two instances of falsification of public documents in order to sell and dispose Transfer Certificate of Title NO. T-110068,” he said.

“Evidently, respondents’ actuations negate their claim of good faith and lend credence to complainants’ claims.”

Investigations showed the five respondents were incorporators of Rizal Park Hotel Inc. (RPHI), the registered owner of the Luneta Hotel and the 450-square-meter lot where it stands in front of Rizal Park along T.M. Kalaw Street in Manila.

The case arose from a complainant filed by H.E. Heacock Resources Corp., represented by corporate secretary Santiago Alvarez Jr., before the Department of Justice (DOJ).

In his complaint, Alvarez said the RPHI incorporators have transferred all their shares through Deeds of Assignment on Sept. 15, 1973.

The respondents were then appointed trustees of Heacock, he added. However, Heacock later learned that the respondents – using a new corporate name, Rizal Park Corp., and presenting another title – sold the property to Beaumont Holdings Corp. on May 15, 2007 for P25 million, Alvarez said.

Alvarez said the respondents also tried to sell the Luneta Hotel in September 1987 to JBA Group of Management and Development Corp, but the Registry of Deeds of Manila found that they were using a fake title.

In the second attempt to sell the hotel, Cristobal – representing himself as the duly elected corporate secretary of RPHI – filed a petition for lost duplicate copy of the title, Alvarez said.

During preliminary investigation, the respondents denied the charges against them. They questioned the Deeds of Assignment of Heacock as incomplete and the period of its effectivity lapsed.

DOJ prosecutors, however, said the case has become a question of “credibility of statements of witnesses” that should be resolved in a full-blown court trial.

In 2007, Beaumont announced the hotel would undergo structural rehabilitation and retrofitting. The hotel is dubbed as one of the few remaining structures that survived World War II.

It is also being touted as the only structure in the country reminiscent of French Renaissance architecture with Filipino stylized beaux arts.

Completed in 1918, it was designed by Spanish architect-engineer Salvador Farre, according to a study by Dean John Joseph Fernandez of the University Of Santo Tomas College Of Architecture.

The dilapidated building was declared a historical landmark by the National Historical Institute. It is protected by Presidential Decree 1505, which makes it unlawful to alter or destroy the original features of an edifice classified by the NHI “without prior written permission from its chairman.”