A BULACAN-BASED businesswoman on Wednesday clarified that the syndicated estafa and extortion complaint filed against her and three other persons have long been dismissed by the city prosecutor of Quezon City.
In a statement sent to The Manila Times, businesswoman Dina Joson Castro said the Quezon City Prosecutors’ Office dismissed the complaint filed against her by Zhefeng Tang, a Chinese, and the local government of Makati City way back in July 2019.
Also named as respondents to the complaint were Rudthen Mendoza, Jomar Diga and Marcelino Aquino.
Mendoza was director of the National Bureau of Investigation Bulacan District Office.
The resolution signed by Assistant City Prosecutor Felomina Apostol-Lopez said the complaint was dismissed for lack of probable cause and for insufficiency of evidence.
Aside from syndicated estafa and extortion, they were also charged with falsification of public documents and illegal possession of firearms.
“What happened last September 29, 2018 was untrue. I, along with a notable former Bulacan NBI Director, Agent Rudthen Mendoza, did not extort any money from the Chinese national. In fact, I was not present during the entrapment operation in Makati City Castro said in a statement.
“It appears that it was an illegal arrest and it was proven that all of us, the accused, were innocent,” she pointed out.
“It breaks our heart that we are the ones who endure all the backlash and suffering from all the false accusations thrown at us even though we are not even involved in the first place.”
Case records indicated that the complainant (Tang) claimed to have met Castro and a certain BJ Panganiban, who introduced himself as a project manager, at the Makati City Hall in March 2018.