Man nabbed for illegal bank withdrawals

MANILA, Philippines - A man was arrested in a bank in Quezon City Friday for allegedly making unauthorized withdrawals from a businessman’s bank account.

Lambert Lorenze Abargos, 26, went to the bank at the Muñoz market at around 10 a.m. and tried withdrawing P26,000 from the bank account of businessman Tom Pua, 27, by posing as the account holder, Senior Police Officer 2 Marlon Zabala said.

Policemen seized from Abargos Bureau of Internal Revenue and postal identification cards with the picture of the suspect but with the name of Pua, who is a resident of Cauayan, Isabela. They also recovered a bank withdrawal slip where Abargos forged a signature of Pua.

Because of this, Abargos is facing charges of attempted theft, forgery and falsification of public documents.

Zabala said the suspect had already withdrawn a total of P48,000 from different branches of the bank from the same account of Pua. 

The investigator explained that because of the past illegal withdrawals Pua submitted a complaint to the bank.

When Abargos went to the bank on Friday, bank teller Darwin Agcaoili noticed that there was a pending complaint from Pua about the unauthorized withdrawals and informed the bank manager about it.

Abargos was then asked by bank personnel to present identification cards. When the bank checked the IDs handed by Abargos, it was found that the suspect was not the account holder.