Isabela councilor, wife charged with large-scale illegal recruitment

ILAGAN, Isabela – A councilor of an interior town in the southeastern part of this province and his wife were charged with 16 counts of large-scale illegal recruitment involving six different cases before the provincial prosecutor’s office here.

Charged were Jones town councilor John Sabiniano and his wife Elma, who allegedly victimized dozens of their townmates by promising them non-existent jobs in Malaysia.

Sabiniano’s wife, a barangay councilwoman, was also charged separately with three more counts of large-scale illegal recruitment. 

Provincial prosecutor Anthony Foz said his office would formally transmit the case to the regional trial court in Echague town next week. 

At present, he said prosecutor Don Antonio Mar Abogado is handling the complaints against the Sabiniano couple.

The Sabinianos allegedly recruited their townmates for supposed high-paying jobs in Sarawak, Malaysia and were paid placement fees ranging from P30,000 to P120,000.

The job recruits left the country through a Pasay City agency, the Starcase Human Resources and Training Center.

But instead of work as factory workers as promised, the victims said they were placed in menial jobs in Sarawak by the Sabinianos’ Malaysian partner, a certain Simon J.M. Teo, alias Rylie Teo, while of some of them were allegedly forced into hard labor. 

The victims were able to return to the country late last year after being rescued by the Malaysian police in Sarawak and the Philippine Embassy in Kuala Lumpur.

Jones municipal officials led by Mayor Florante Raspado, with the help of the Philippine Embassy in Malaysia, facilitated the repatriation of the victims, who all had expired tourist visas by then, having entered Sarawak on different dates from August to September last year.