PHILIPPINES NEWS SERVICE — THE Philippines has ceased to be a safe haven for foreigners eluding the law in their countries.
An American wanted in the United States for possessing and selling illegal drugs was arrested by Bureau of Immigration (BI), boosting its campaign against foreign fugitives who think they can use the Philippines as a hiding place.
BI Commissioner Marcelino Libanan said 50-year-old James Ricky Perry, who is said to be using various aliases, was nabbed inside his residence in Calatagan, Batangas.
Libanan said that when he entered the country last March, Perry used the name Rodney Eugene Williams.
It was later found that the passport he used was bogus and that there was no record of his travel document in the U.S.
In his report, Atty. Floro Balato Jr., BI-Interpol chief, said Perry is wanted to stand trial before a U.S. district court in North Carolina which issued a warrant for his arrest on narcotics charges.
Records have it that Perry had been charged in July 2005 with two counts of conspiracy to distribute five kilos of cocaine and possession of 500 grams of the same drug.
Perry will thus be deported for being an undesirable, undocumented and overstaying alien and it was learned from Balato that Perry’s passport was already canceled by the U.S. embassy.
The arrest of Perry was hailed by Libanan as another big accomplishment for the BI-Interpol unit following its creation just a couple of weeks ago.