Investment scam suspect falls after hiding for 3 years

CAMP VICENTE LIM, Laguna, Philippines   â€“ After jumping bail in 2010, an investment scam suspect finally fell in Tagaytay City yesterday, authorities said.

With suspect Vincel Pedernal, 33, in their hands, police are still tracking down his wife, Anna Fatima, sister of former basketball player Paolo Mendoza.

The Pedernals, who ran Agri-Point Enterprises which supposedly imported plastic resin from China, face charges of large-scale estafa and have 31 warrants of arrest from various courts.

Senior Superintendent Pedro Cabatingan, regional director of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, said Pedernal was arrested along Rotunda Street in Tagaytay.

Cabatingan said the Pedernals defrauded at least 100 people in Padre Garcia town and Lipa City in Batangas as well as in Manila and Pampanga of an estimated P1 billion in 2011.

As modus operandi, police said the couple would entice people to invest in their company and would issue postdated checks to them supposedly as guarantee of 10-percent profit sharing.