Just like on Netflix
Real estate scion Victor Consunji likens the alleged modus operandi of his ex-publicist Lana Faith Johnson to that of The Tinder Swindler and Anna Delvey, two individuals who defrauded people of big money and whose stories were made popular in Netflix documentaries.
Indeed, listening to Victor, son of tycoon Isidro “Sid” Consunji, narrate his side of the story, I am in disbelief. I feel like I am again watching a new season of the two Netflix shows.
Lana served as Victor’s trusted employee, working with him for eight years. Last Nov. 11, news broke that Lana was detained for days by Taguig authorities because of a complaint filed by Victor’s property company Victor Consunji Development Corp. She was released after posting bail.
Her M.O. or modus operandi, says Victor, is that she would allegedly use the money meant for a certain contract to pay off another one that she previously did not pay despite the money being released already by Victor’s company to her agency. “Until the whole thing imploded,” Victor tells me. In The Tinder Swindler, we saw how Israeli conman Simon Leviev used the dating application Tinder to lure individuals emotionally and dupe them into financially supporting his lavish lifestyle. Reinventing Anna’s Anna Sorokin, also known as Anna Delvey, meanwhile, is the Russian-born con artist who posed as a wealthy heiress and tricked people for money to fund her lavish lifestyle.
The common M.O. perpetuated by these two global swindlers of Netflix fame is getting money from people to fund one expense after another. It is similar to a Ponzi scheme, which generates returns for earlier investors with money taken from later investors.
Lana’s denial
I talked to Lana, too and, not surprisingly, she claims innocence. She has issued a statement, denying all allegations against her. Part of Lana’s statement reads:
“On my end, I have complied with all their requirements and liquidated what has been spent. Paper trail of funds were submitted and on October 28, 2022, Certificates of Completion were submitted.
“A certain supplier claimed that the company, through me, allegedly owes them ten million. No service agreement was signed by me with the obligation to pay any other amount than what was already paid for.”
Unliquidated expenses
A complaint for qualified theft filed last Nov. 4 by VCDC before the Office of the City Prosecutor in Taguig says that Lana had requested numerous amounts from the company for the payment of various projects, events and suppliers, documented in 64 disbursement vouchers.
This 24-page public document – excluding annexes of supporting papers – noted that the unliquidated expenses in Lana’s name have swelled to P45.5 million.
In the Netflix documentaries, both Simon and Anna claim innocence, despite being caught and despite several witnesses attesting otherwise.
It will be up to the courts to decide on the respective positions of Victor Consunji, VCDC, its suppliers and Lana Faith Johnson.
Indeed, it will be up to the courts to determine whether Lana is indeed guilty or innocent.
Justice system
However, knowing how the wheels of our justice system turn, I am sure it will probably grind slow and it will take time to get to the bottom of the issue.
But it shouldn’t. In the past, the reason why so many swindlers and fraudsters get away with duping people is our slow justice system.
Stories of fraud
Stories of swindling and fraud are some of the issues closest to my heart. It irks me to see that people earn the trust of others only to betray them in the end.
There should be a special place in hell for people who dupe others of their hard-earned money.
I once got obsessed with a story of Jose Cecilio “Jay” Peñaflor, a former Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) employee who was at the center of an estimated P300million investment scam sometime in 2016.
Several individuals trusted him with their savings, thinking that the money would be invested in stocks but they ended up losing their money.
I wonder what happened to the case of Peñaflor? Last I heard, he faced estafa charges but was later released.
Making the poor rich
Another recent scam was that of KAPA-Community Ministry International, founded by Joel Apolinario.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) calls KAPA the biggest Ponzi scam the country has seen in recent years.
KAPA stands for Kabus Padatoon, which in Bisaya means “make the poor rich.”
But as the SEC found out, KAPA is an investment scam. Five million people may have been duped by this supposedly religious organization and an estimated P50 billion may have flowed into KAPA, the SEC said.
KAPA’s scheme was simple. It sought “donations” and “blessings” in the name of God. An investment of at least P10,000 would get a 30 percent monthly return for life.
The fake ministry targeted public school teachers, converting them supposedly into laid-back investors from the perennial borrower stereotype.
Apolinario is in detention on charges of syndicated estafa.
Conviction In reality, here in the Philippines, very few have been convicted for defrauding people. There are hundreds of cases but convictions are rare.
Among the few convictions was that of Rosario Baladjay, the so-called Pyramid Scam Queen who duped people in the 90s to invest in her “pseudo investment” company, Multitel. It was estimated that her business defrauded people of some P20 million.
We need to see more convictions given the piles and piles of estafa and cases of fraud and we need to do it fast. In the US, fake biotech star Elizabeth Holmes was sentenced to over 11 years in prison for defrauding investors with her Silicon Valley start-up firm. It was only in 2014 when Holmes’ Theranos became the subject of a Wall Street Journal investigation.
In contrast, here in the Philippines, the wheels of justice turn impossibly slow. Authorities need to address this. Otherwise, swindlers and thieves will continue to defraud Filipinos of their hard-earned money and yes, perhaps even love, as in the case of the Tinder Swindler.
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