Suspected drug trafficking case initially a smuggling try

SUBIC BAY FREEPORT, Philippines — Law enforcers here who apprehended suspected drug trafficker Anthony Ang last year explained that they thought they were only dealing with a simple case of smuggling and that is why they only sought help from the Presidential Anti-Smuggling Group (PASG) and not the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).

“We had no idea that the boxes Ang carried actually contained shabu,” Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority senior deputy administrator for operations Ferdinand Hernandez said in reaction to criticisms that the SBMA did not bring PDEA early on in the case.

In a statement, Hernandez clarified this issue after President Arroyo ordered a manhunt for Ang, who was reported to have slipped out of the country recently.

Hernandez said that there was no reason initially for law enforcers to suspect that Ang’s cargo contained drugs.

“The boxes even yielded a negative reaction from drug-sniffing dogs,” Hernandez added.

“This is precisely the reason why we called PASG and not the PDEA,” he said.

He explained that Ang insisted that the boxes contained computer parts.

“And because Ang was a registered investor in Subic, he was given due courtesy even when we detained his cargo while he promised to produce the necessary documents,” Hernandez said.

Hernandez added that the PDEA was only informed of the case when SBMA and PASG operatives opened the boxes later in the presence of representatives from Hualong International Inc., Ang’s registered company in the Freeport, and found out that the eight boxes actually contained drugs.

At the time, however, Ang, who had promised to return with documents, had gone missing, along with his family. His employees at Hualong denied any knowledge of the contents of Ang’s cargo or his whereabouts.

Ang was first apprehended by SBMA policemen in the evening of May 25, 2008, when he tried to bring out of Subic’s SRF area eight boxes from the Vietnamese-registered boat FB Shun Fa Xing.

When questioned by authorities, Ang refused to open the boxes and pleaded with SBMA officials to release what he described were “sensitive computer parts.”

According to Hernandez, the Freeport police however informed Ang that they would only release his cargo if Ang could produce the necessary documents and a full inspection of the cargo is made.