AMLC: Lani Mercado’s firm made bank deposits when Cambe received kickbacks

By PATRICIA DENISE CHIU, GMA News

Published October 9, 2014 6:40pm

A company reportedly controlled by Senator Ramon Revilla Jr.'s wife had P27 million deposited in its bank account despite having no record of ever having been in operation, a representative of the Anti-Money Laundering Council told the Sandiganbayan on Thursday.

During Revilla's bail hearing on Thursday, AMLC representative Leigh Vohn Santos testified that Cavite Representative Lani Mercado's Nature Concepts Development and Realty Corporation made the deposits approximately during the times when Revilla's staff member Richard Cambe allegedly received kickback money from Benhur Luy.

Luy is the former trusted aide of alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim Napoles. He has since turned whistleblower and is the primary witness in the government's plunder and graft charges against Revilla, Cambe, Napoles and Senators Juan Ponce Enrile and Jinggoy Estrada.

“The Nature Concepts Development and Realty Corporation is controlled by Lani Mercado. Despite the insubstantial capital, it received substantial amounts through deposits totaling P27,745,000, most of which, amount-wise, were done proximate to the time Cambe received cash from Luy, and during the period when it apparently had no operations,” Santos told the court.

The AMLC report Santos presented cited specific instances when Luy to Cambe meant for Revilla matched deposits to Mercado's Nature Concepts account.

"On August 2 and 10, 2007, Cambe received a total of P5 million. A few days later, on August 13, 2007, a check deposit with the same amount was credited to nature Concepts' account," the AMLC report said.

Revilla's lawyer Jeffrey Zarate sought to downplay the impplications of the AMLC's findings.

"The report is not conclusive," Zarate told reporters after the hearing.

The AMLC report said the company made deposits of P5 million in August and P2.2 million in December, both in 2007; P645,000 in July 2008; P15.5 million in October 2009; and P4.6 million in May and P4.8 million in October, both in 2010. The total amount in deposits during those times was P27,745,000.

The deposits were made to the company's account in Asia United Bank in Imus.

Nature Concepts, a trading company, has a listed address along the Aguinaldo Highway, in Bacoor, Cavite. Mercado is the representative of the second district of Cavite, which comprises the whole of Bacoor City.

In his testimony, Santos revealed that the AMLC reached the conclusion that Nature Concepts had no real operations since records from the Securities and Exchanges Commission showed no activity.

“The Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) provided us with documents on Nature Concepts from 2011 to 2012. Upon examination of earnings, we found that there were no earnings, but there were huge deposits to its bank accounts,” Santos said.

Revilla is accused of allegedly receiving millions of pesos in kickbacks from Napoles in exchange for chanelling his Priority Development Assistance Fund allocations to Napoles' dubious non-government organizations.

In addition to the P27 million, the AMLC found a paper trail that supposedly traced another P16 million that the Revillas deposited to Nature Concepts’ accounts.

During his testimony, Santos revealed that the AMLC originally conducted their investigation into the pork barrel scam due to three triggers, which included the six-part report of the Philippine Daily Inquirer that blew the lid off of the alleged scam.

Santos also revealed that the National Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Ombudsman wrote the AMLC separately requesting for an investigation. Santos said accounts of Revilla’s family members were also examined. —NB, GMA News

Tags: sandiganbayan, porkbarrelscam, bantaykaban, ramonrevillajr