Four men have found themselves in the tight grip of the law, facing charges over an alleged scheme of bribery and money laundering connected to the 2016 elections in the Philippines. The indictment, unsealed by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Florida, targets two executives from a company delivering voting machines and services and a former key election official from the Asian nation.
Caught in the scandal are Roger Alejandro Pinate Martinez and Jorge Miguel Vasquez, both anchoring their lives in Florida— for at least a while longer. Their conspiracy, as the indictment alleges, ran from 2015 to 2018, and involved funneling at least $1 million in bribes to Juan Andres Donato Bautista, the once-commanding chairman of the Philippines' Commission on Elections (COMELEC), a title he holds no longer, according to U.S. Department of Justice.
Their modus operandi reportedly included a slush fund created through the overpricing of voting machines. In coded exchanges that would not be amiss in a spy novel, they artfully orchestrated the fabrication of contracts and loan agreements to curtain the dirty money's paper trail. This cloak-and-dagger financial choreography strutted across bank accounts from Asia to Europe and the American heartland of Florida.
Pinate and Vasquez stare down the barrel of a maximum five-year sentence each if they're found guilty of breaking the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Bautista, alongside Pinate, Vasquez, and one Elie Moreno—a man with Venezuelan and Israeli citizenship—potentially face up to 20 years for each count of money laundering they’ve been saddled with.
The unveiling of this sinister plot was made possible by the collaborative muscle of U.S. Attorney Markenzy Lapointe’s office, as well as various special agents and notable divisions within Homeland Security Investigations and IRS Criminal Investigation in Miami. Their quest for justice sees them backed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Emery and a squad of trial attorneys and assistant chiefs from the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section.
