NBI nabs 3 BIR employees over corruption charges

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has arrested three employees of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) over charges of corruption.

BIR Regional Investigation Division special investigators Arturo Buniol, Gary Atanacio, and Edgardo Javier were arrested in an entrapment operation in Greenhills, San Juan on June 21, the NBI said in a press statement on Monday.

The arrested men face charges before the Office of the Ombudsman for allegedly violating the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and Article 210 (bribery) of the Revised Penal Code, the NBI said.

Buniol, Atanacio and Javier stand charged with asking for a P75,000 cut of a one-year-old restaurant's tax liability in the amount of P1.2 million, the NBI said, explaining a complaint-affidavit filed by Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC) commissioner Greco Belgica before the NBI - Special Task Force.

Belgica alleged he received information from an employee of an unnamed Chinese restaurant that the BIR employees conducted a surveillance on the food place's operations "despite the fact that said restaurant has only been operating for one year."

The now-arrested men allegedly asked the restaurant employee to pay them P600,000, half of the supposed P1.2-million tax liability, and to secure an accountant's services.

Belgica, quoted by the NBI, said he assumed the identity of an accountant named "Kath Legaspi" and through text messages determined the purpose of the amount sought.

"Thru exchange of messages, Comm. Belgica (acting as Kath Legaspi) discovered that the subjects were asking for P75,000 from the P600,000 for restaurant's alleged tax liability and the balance will be given to the 'other side,' which the subjects were referring [to]," the NBI said in a press statement. —KG, GMA News