Maslog guilty of graft in P24-M textbook scam
Nearly 27 years after she and two others were charged with graft for their alleged involvement in a P24-million textbook scam, Mary Ann Maslog was found guilty by the Sandiganbayan Second Division, which sentenced her to a prison term of up to 10 years.
Her conviction, however, for the 1998 textbook scam was overshadowed by the revelation that she was able to leave earlier this month the National Bureau of Investigation compound where she was detained, to visit her supposed husband in the hospital without any court order.
As a result, the prosecution asked that she be transferred to the Correctional Institution for Women in Mandaluyong City.
Presiding Sandiganbayan Justice and Second Division Chair Geralding Econg said the court could not “turn a blind eye” to the incident, saying “the processes of this court cannot be trampled upon.”
She said that her signature, along with those of Associate Justices Arthur Malabaguio and Edgardo Caldona, could have been forged to allow Maslog to leave the NBI.
Maslog, upon questioning, told the court she thought the directive for her release came from them. She said that when she got a phone call from an NBI official identified as Roel Jovenir, who told her they were looking for her because she was a fugitive, she went back to the NBI.
Husband in hospital?
She added that she had gone out to visit her husband, a certain “Wouter De Jong,” who was allegedly confined at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Bonifacio Global City.
Econg, however, had earlier noted that Maslog had not produced a marriage certificate to prove her relationship to De Jong or medical documents about his illness.
The associate justice, meanwhile, directed NBI Director Jaime Santiago to inform them of the results of their ongoing investigation of the incident and at the same time, asked the Office of the Ombudsman to consider looking into the two-hour release of Maslog from detention.
Maslog and two officials of the Department of Education, Culture and Sports (since then renamed as Department of Education) identified as Emilia de la Aranas and Ernesto Guiang were implicated in a P24-million graft case in 1998.
Fake death
The trio were accused of “willfully, unlawfully and criminally” faking documents to secure payments from the Department of Budget and Management for textbooks and supplementary materials. Maslog represented the supposed supplier, Esteem Enterprises.
While Aranas and Guiang were found guilty on Oct. 16, 2020, and sentenced to up to 10 years by the antigraft court, the case against Maslog was dismissed after her lawyer told the court that she died on Nov. 18, 2019.
However, she was arrested in Quezon City on Sept. 25, 2024, for supposedly defrauding two persons of around P8 million in an investment scheme.
Further verification with the courts revealed that Maslog, also known as Mary Ann Evans Smith and Mary Ann Tupa Maslog-Smith, was the subject of two outstanding warrants of arrest in the Makati and Parañaque regional trial courts.
The following month, Maslog, who introduced herself as Jessica Francisco, appeared before a Senate panel claiming that she had been tapped by the Philippine National Police Intelligence Group to help convince dismissed Bamban, Tarlac Mayor Alice Guo to surrender to the police following her escape to Indonesia.
According to Maslog, she was tapped by the police because she is a friend of Sual, Pangasinan Mayor Liseldo “Dong” Calugay, who was suspected of having a relationship with Guo.
However, she was held in contempt for lying about her supposed role in convincing Guo. Several senators also questioned her credibility due to her involvement in the textbook scam. —WITH A REPORT FROM INQUIRER RESEARCH
