Phl embassy welcomes illegal recruiter’s conviction

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine embassy in Washington welcomed yesterday the conviction of an illegal recruiter who failed to deploy a Filipina teacher to the United States after he was paid $5,000.

Isidro Rodriguez was found guilty by Manila Regional Trial Court Branch 25 of illegal recruitment and estafa for failing to deploy the teacher.

“The Philippine embassy welcomes the conviction of illegal recruiter Isidro Rodriguez in a case involving a Filipina he promised a teaching job in the US,” the embassy said on Twitter.

Rodriguez was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment and fined P300,000 for illegal recruitment. The court also sentenced him to serve four years and two months in prison to 20 years for estafa.

He was also ordered by the court to pay the teacher P250,000 in damages.

Rodriguez remains at large and is at the top of a watch list of the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking, the Anti-Money Laundering Council and the Bureau of Immigration.

He is facing 20 other cases involving 73 complaints pending before various courts – both in the Philippines and the US – and the Department of Justice (DOJ). 

According to Migrante International, Rodriguez was released last May 8 after some teachers settled the case. He was supposed to appear before the DOJ on May 13 but he failed to show up.

Labor attaché Angel Borja said the embassy will also recommend that employment opportunities being offered to Filipinos in the US be first verified to determine if such jobs exist.

He said a total of 21 illegal recruitment cases have been filed against Rodriguez while 41 recruitment violation cases have been filed against his company, Renaissance Staffing Support Center Inc. in Manila.

Borja said Rodriguez’s victims could be as many as 1,000 – all of them teachers he allegedly was able to convince to pay him $10,000 to $15,000 each for non-existent jobs in various public schools across the US from 2003 to 2007.