Because of his alleged gambling problem, a Department of Trade and Industry employee is now facing criminal charges after he pawned 15 laptops of the government agency in Makati City.
Police Major Gigeon Ines Jr., Makati police Investigation Unit chief, identified the suspect as Prudencio Moralda, a DTI computer technician.
During an inventory on July 15, Marissa Rubio, information system analyst of DTI, discovered that 15 of their laptops were missing.
This prompted them to check their closed-circuit television footages. She found out that it was Moralda who took the 15 laptops.
Rubio went to the Makati police to report what she discovered.
After questioning Moralda, Ines said that he confessed to pawning the laptops in a pawnshop in Barangay Guadalupe, Makati.
“Moralda said that he pawned the 15 laptops and a hard disk at a pawnshop in Guadalupe. He showed us his receipts. He got around P200,000 from the pawnshop,” Ines said.
“He was reportedly a gambler that’s why he pawned the laptops to get money,” Ines added.
He said that they retrieved all the laptops pawned by Moralda.
“I sent a letter on Aug. 6 to PTS Pawnshop management for the return of the stolen laptop computers to DTI citing provisions of RA (Republic Act) 1612 (Anti-Fencing Law),” Ines said.
Moralda is now facing qualified theft charges. (Jel Santos)
