NBI starts examining Guo's fingerprints -- Director Santiago

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has started examining the fingerprints of suspended Mayor Alice L. Guo of Bamban, Tarlac, Director Jaime B. Santiago said on Thursday, June 27.

Santiago said the NBI started the fingerprint examination after he received a letter from Sen. Risa Hontiveros who asked the bureau to look into its records of Guo on suspicion that the mayor is a Chinese national with the name Guo Hua Ping.

Acting on the request, he said he tasked the NBI’s Identification Records Division (NBI-IRD) “to look into it and cooperate with the Senate.”

“I tell you ang fingerprint na nakatabi sa aming (that is stored in our) records that is an infallible science of identification,” Santiago said. 

“No two persons will have the same fingerprints,” he pointed out.

"Kahit na mag iba-iba ka ng pangalan, mag iba-iba ka ng mukha, litrato (even if you change your name, change your face, photos), whatever, your fingerprint will never change,” he stressed.

During a hearing on Wednesday, June 26, at the Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality that Hontiveros chairs, two NBI records were presented that showed that there are two Alice L. Guo who have different facial photographs but have the same birthdate of July 12, 1986 and birth place of Tarlac.

Guo and several co-respondets are facing a qualified human trafficking complaint before the Department of Justice (DOJ) in connection with the illegal operations of Zun Yuan Technology Center, the Philippine Offshore Gaming Operator (POGO) that was raided by government authorities in Bamban.

The mayor has been suspended preventively by the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB) for six months on the basis of the administrative complaints filed by the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).