PLEASE SHARE: WARNING TO SPOUSES & PARENTS OF *SEAFARERS By Iloilo Shipping News Via Rock Drilon There are unscrupulous persons who are preying on spouses and parents of seafarers in an extortion racket. Last week, the wife of an Ilonggo seafarer received a call at around midnight by a man who introduced himself as a Third Engineer from the manning company he was connected with. The caller said her husband had stabbed the chief engineer on his vessel as it docked in Rotterdam, and that he himself was badly wounded in the incident. Her husband was smuggled into the country, the caller said, and taken to a hospital in Manila to undergo surgery to save his life. Padalhan mo ako ng P50,000 kaagad para pambayad sa ospital, the caller instructed her. The wife was frantic. She didnt have that much money, she said. She was asked to call back after an hour. Its a good thing the wife had awakened her family. One of her in-laws smelled a rat in the call. She texted the caller she didnt have enough load on her cell phone to make the return call. The man called again, even though he had said earlier he had ran out of load. My husband has a brother in Manila, she said. Tell me which hospital so he can go there at once to attend to his needs. The caller refused to give her the requested information. Her husband was being hunted by the NBI, he said, and his whereabouts was confidential. She refused to believe him after that. In short, she didnt fall for the scam. Interestingly, she wondered how the man knew that her husband was due to fly home from Rotterdam. In fact, when that call came, her husband was about to land in Hongkong, totally unaware of what had transpired. She also wondered how the caller got hold of her home phone number and cell phone number. He seemed familiar with the circumstances of her husbands employment as a seafarer. He knew the ships name and the companys name. Are company insiders involved in this scam? *Pinoys comprise 30+% of the worlds sailors
Posted on: Sat, 07 Jun 2014 21:11:53 +0000
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