SAN CARLOS CITY–The five-man fact-finding committee formed by the city mayor here to probe a missing P9-million public fund corroborates the finding of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) that cashier-designate Leny Fermin is behind the crime.

In a 16-page report submitted to Mayor Julier Resuello on July 16, the committee said Fermin committed malversation of public funds and has recommending the filing of both criminal and administrative charges against her, particularly grave misconduct in the performance of her duties and responsibilities.

Others recommended to be charged are Dinah Rico, the signature verifier of the Land Bank of the Philippines branch here, suspected to have conspired with Fermin, and two employees in the city hall’s accounting office, namely Vilma Cristobal and Marissa Mendoza.

The committee, however, has cleared City Treasurer Arturo Mandapat of involvement in the crime.

The NBI filed a criminal complaint before the Ombudsman on July 6 against Fermin for malversation and perjury while Mandapat was charged with perjury and malversation thru negligence, being Fermin’s superior officer.

In a press conference held here Thursday, City Legal Officer Rodolfo Samson, chairman of the probe team, said their investigation showed that Fermin is liable for three counts of malversation of public funds and should be charged separately for each count as the crime was committed in separate and distinct transactions.

Aside from the P9-million in question, which was encashed in one check March 31 this year, two other checks worth P2 million and P5 million respectively, were allegedly encashed and deposited into a personal bank account of Fermin.

Efforts by the team to verify from MetroBank if Fermin did put in the P9 million and P2 million amounts in her personal account were blocked when the manager invoked the Bank Secrecy Law.

Fermin claims that the P9 million fund was taken from her by unidentified men who held her up right after she encashed the money on March 31. She reported the incident to Mandapat on May 18.

“Her failure to report the incident for about 48 days reckoned from the date of the reported incident put to gravest doubt the veracity of her report of a hold-up,” the committee said.

Aside from failing to immediately report the incident to authorities, the committee said it was also odd that Fermin appeared not have been affected by what happened.

FORGED SIGNATURE

The committee also reported that the mayor’s signature on the checks was obviously forged.

“The signature verifier of Land Bank cannot feign not to have discovered the forged signatures of the mayor in those two checks because the dissimilarities of the specimen signatures of the mayor as submitted to the bank and that appearing in the alluded two checks appear to be apparent and distinguishable by the naked eye,” the committee reported.

An expert from the NBI head office in Manila has conducted an investigation on the checks and is expected to issue an official report soon.

NO EVIDENCE ON MANDAPAT

As for Mandapat, the committee said they did not find evidence that Mandapat has a “unity of purpose and unity in the execution of the unlawful objective with Leny Fermin”.

“While it is true that the procedural steps spelled out in the Manual is that before the signatories will have to sign the check, the disbursement voucher should have been already approved by the local chief executive, however, it cannot be gainsaid as a we can clearly glean from the testimonies of concerned witnesses that it has been made the procedural practice in check, disbursement that the mayor is made to sign the check simultaneously with the voucher,” the probe team’s report said.

The team interviewed 15 people including Resuello and Mandapat.

“We have found no sufficient evidence to conclude that the treasurer connived with the principal suspect,” said Samson.

Nevertheless, Resuello and Samson said the findings of the team would be forwarded to the NBI for their assessment and consideration. —LM

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