The Court of Tax Appeals (CTA) has denied the petition that sought the return of US$491,600 in cash that was confiscated by the Bureau of Customs (BOC) at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in 2019.
“After a full review of the parties’ respective arguments and evidence, we rule to deny the present petition for lack of merit,” stated the 26-page decision of the CTA En Banc penned by Associate Justice Henry S. Angeles and promulgated last Jan. 9.
Denied was the petition filed by Sharalyn S. Pedrena, a money changer operator, and her employees Chang L. Mohammad, Johnny S. Yusup, Ferdaus A. Omarand Armand P. Daud.
They sought the reversal of the 2020 decision of the BOC on the seizure of the US$491,600.
The case stemmed from the seizure of US649,600 from Mohammad who arrived from Hong Kong and only declared US$148,000.
The petitioners claimed that Mohammad went to Hong Kong to purchase watches and pieces of jewelry and returned to the Philippines with the unspent cash in his possession.
Following a compromise deal, the petitioners only got back a total of US$158,000 which represent the declared amount and the US$10,000 which can be brought into the country without the need of declaration.
In denying the petition, the CTA said: “Mohammad committed actual and intentional fraud when he brought into the country the subject money, which he had a duty to disclose under CAO (Customs Administrative Order) 1-2017 in relation to the provisions of the CMTA (Customs Modernization and Tariff Act) and BSP MORFXT (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Manual of Regulations on Foreign Exchange Transactions), but, without any convincing or justifiable reason, did not disclose the same, and tried to make it through Customs had he not been stopped by the Customs officers on duty.”
“Concomitantly, petitioners failed to prove, to the satisfaction of this Court, pursuant to the quantum of evidence required for this case, that petitioners did not commit fraud when Mohammad did not declare the USD491,600 he was carrying upon his arrival in the Philippines from Hong Kong,” the tax court pointed out.