(Bloomberg) -- The Philippines on Friday filed money laundering charges against a former town mayor believed to have fled the country and is now wanted for alleged crimes linked to China-centric online casinos.
The National Bureau of Investigation, the Anti-Money Laundering Council, and the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission filed complaints against 36 individuals including dismissed Mayor Alice Guo, court documents show. A week ago, Philippine authorities said Guo had left the country.
Guo along with the other individuals and entities “are alleged to have been involved in a complex scheme of money laundering linked to the crimes of estafa, qualified trafficking in persons” and violations of the country’s securities regulations, the Anti-Money Laundering Council said in a statement.
On top of the laundering charges, the council is also seeking to forfeit assets valued at over 6 billion pesos ($107 million) that it said were “accumulated by Guo and her associates through their unlawful activities.”
The charges were made more than a month since Guo went missing. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. last week warned that “heads will roll” after she was found to have left the country and traveled to Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore in the past month.
The ex-mayor of Bamban city in Tarlac province north of the capital went missing in mid-July when an arrest order was issued against her. Since then, dozens of bank accounts and other assets linked to Guo had been frozen by authorities over allegations of fraud, money laundering and human trafficking.
Her lawyer, Stephen David, didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg News’ request for comment. Guo’s camp had repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. She was investigated by the Senate over her alleged ties to China-focused casinos that have since been banned.
In their complaint, the Philippine agencies noted substantial discrepancy between the working capital and increase in the business transaction of companies where Guo is an incorporator. Investigations on transactions between 2019 and 2024 on her bank accounts and assets showed that Guo and the companies in which she’s a part of had transferred funds from alleged fraudulent sources, it said.
(Updates with statement from Anti-Money Laundering Council.)
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