2 Chinese traders get life for drug dealing

"We’ll be dead by then."

These were the words uttered by two Chinese traders who were sentenced to two life terms yesterday, two years after they were nabbed selling some 20 kilos of shabu in Manila.

Manila Judge Teresa Soriaso of Regional Trial Court Branch 27 found Ping Ching Choi, 51, a native of Fukien, China and Zhi Xiao Chen, 33, of Fujian, China guilty of violating the Anti-Drug Law and sentenced both to two terms of reclusion perpetua.

Soriaso also ordered them to pay P2 million each in fines. The judge also ordered the forfeiture of two cars owned by the convicts in favor of the government.

After the verdict was read, a court interpreter informed the two men of their sentence, to they replied: "We’ll be dead by then."

Court records showed that Ping and Zhi were arrested on July 27, 2000 in front of a restaurant near the Quirino Grandstand shortly after selling shabu to an undercover agent of the Philippine National Police Narcotics Group.

An informant had told police that a known big-time drug dealer named Choi, who turned out to be Ping, was looking for a buyer of a huge quantity of shabu.

SPO3 Juanito Pasamonte, who acted as the buyer, testified in court that he contacted Ping and arranged a five-kilo drug deal at P400,000 per kilo of shabu.

The following day, the shabu deal was carried out at the Quirino Grandstand at around 10:30 p.m. Policemen then arrested the two. They found 15 more kilos of shabu inside the compartment of Zhi’s car.

In defense, Ping denied the charges and accused the arresting policemen of extortion.

However, Judge Soriaso ruled that the prosecution, headed by state Prosecutor Roberto Lao, had established that Ping and Zhi sold and delivered drugs to Pasamonte.

"The principal defenses of the accused were alibi and denial, which are self serving and cannot prevail in the light of the testimony of the prosecution witnesses," the judge said in her 25-page decision.

Meanwhile, the government’s anti-drug campaign hit a snag yesterday after a Chinese-Filipino drug trafficker escaped from a detention cell of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) at Camp Crame over the weekend.

Henry Tan, arrested in Zambales in November last year for possession of 350 kilos of shabu, escaped last Sunday by sawing off the iron grill of his cell. – With Christina Mendez