Mighty Corporation pleads innocence before Doj on

tax evasion case

A LAWYER of embattled local cigarette firm Mighty Corp. maintained his

clients innocence in the P26.93-billion tax-evasion complaint before state
prosecutors on Thursday.

The Department of Justice (DoJ) yesterday held its first preliminary investigation
on the second of three tax evasion raps filed by the Bureau of Internal Revenue
(BIR) against Mighty Corp.

Members of the media were barred from covering the hearing, but Abraham
Espejo, representing Mighty Corp., told reporters outside the hearing: They have
not committed any crime that they are being pilloried. Give us a chance to be
heard. Thats my request.

I assure you that my clients will be able to prove that all of these accusations are
not true, Mr. Espejo added.

Mr. Espejo represents the four respondents in the case, namely: Mighty Corp.
President Edilberto P. Adan, Executive Vice-President Oscar P. Barrientos, Vice-
President for External Affairs and Assistant Corporate Secretary Alexander D.
Wongchuking, and Treasurer Ernesto A. Victa.

The lawyer said that their camp filed a counter-affidavit with annexes reaching to
thousand of pages. Kaya kami nagfa-file ng (That is why we are filing the)
counter-affidavit, we want due process. We do not want kangaroo-style
proceedings here. I reiterate, we will fight, Mr. Espejo also said.

Asked how he thinks the case is proceeding, he replied that the case is doubtful,
questionable, as a student of constitutional law, you will know the effect if
evidence is obtained illegally, its inadmissible. Not only is the evidence
inadmissible, its also questionable.
He added that the case could be due to business rivalry, but did not elaborate.

The BIR first filed the tax evasion case worth P9.56 billion against Mighty Corp.
on March 22. The BIR, in a statement released upon filing, said: [t]he respondent
corporation was the subject of an on-the-spot surveillance operation of untaxed
cigarette products conducted [last March 1] in San Simon Industrial Park (SSIP),
San Isidro, Pampanga and that random checks on 10 master cases of cigarettes in
four warehouses in the economic zone leased by Mighty showed that internal
revenue stamps affixed on the cigarette packs were fake.

Subsequent inventory of all cigarette packs in the warehouses concerned showed

that Mighty stored there 66,281 master cases with 33,140,500 cigarette packs.

The investigation further showed that 87.5% of the said packs bore fake internal
revenue stamps, the BIR said.

The stamps are fake since they did not contain one of the multi-layered security
features of a valid internal revenue stamp, the BIR added.

The said case was deemed submitted for resolution last May 30.

Mighty Corp. is also facing a third complaint from the BIR, worth P1.39 billion.
The three complaints bring the total alleged tax liabilities of Mighty Corp. to
P37.88 billion the largest tax evasion case so far under the administration of
President Rodrigo R. Duterte.

The case is handled by a three-man panel of state prosecutors led by Senior

Assistant State Prosecutor Sebastian Caponong, Jr. The other members are
Assistant State Prosecutors Ma. Lourdes Uy and Mary Ann Parong. Kristine Joy
V. Patag