Inside job eyed in P18-M robbery at forex shop

Police are eyeing an “inside job” angle in the P18 million robbery at a heavily-guarded foreign exchange shop located inside a mall in the Greenhills shopping center in San Juan City over the weekend.

“It looks like it (robbery) cannot be done without inside information. We are looking more into the “inside job angle,” said Senior Superintendent Leon Nilo de la Cruz, director of the Eastern Police District.

De la Cruz said they invited for questioning the management and employees of the Sanry’s foreign exchange and the JT photo shop, located at the ground floor of the Unimart shopping mall, and the 30 security guards on duty at the time, to shed light on the incident.

After taking down their statements, De la Cruz said they will subject those giving inconsistent stories to lie detector tests.

The EPD director dispatched four additional police investigators from the District Investigation and Detective Management (DIDM) to help the San Juan police in taking down the statements of at least 40 people invited for questioning with regard to the heist.

“Because of a large number of people being interviewed, we expect the taking of statements to be over in several days,” he said.

De la Cruz admitted they are facing a blank wall as to the identity of the suspects in the heist, believed pulled off between the night of Nov. 30 and the wee hours of the morning of Dec. 1.

Initial investigation showed that security guards manning the 12 entry and exit points of the Unimart mall noticed nothing unusual during their watch. The EPD director said that the suspects gained entry into the two establishments by detaching the galvanized sheets at the roof of the building.

 Responding Scene of the Crime Operatives (SOCO) recovered a wrench, pliers and different types of tools inside the foreign exchange shop. The vault of the foreign exchange shop, which was opened by an acetylene torch, was found outside the office.

Neri Sunga, 52, owner of the shop, said the vault contained P18 million.

It was Sunga who discovered the robbery at 8:10 a.m. on Dec. 1. However, she reported the robbery to the local police hours later.

Aside from the foreign exchange shop, its adjacent establishment, JT photo shop owned by Josefina Tiongson has lost an undetermined amount of cash to the thieves.

De la Cruz said they will ask Sunga why the money in the vault was not transferred to their preferred bank when “it was too big” to be kept inside their establishment.

“We also wanted to know how many people, especially employees and security guards, knew that there is a large amount inside the vault. Somebody tipped the robbers off. And we wanted to unmask him or her,” said De la Cruz.

The EPD director said there are two security agencies-Prime Security and Anti-Crime Security Agency – employed by the shopping mall to secure its premises.