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For the past 20 years, The Filipino Express has provided the Filipino American community the best news, arts and entertainment coverage from around the United States and the Philippines.
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This website includes selected articles from this week's edition of the Filipino Express. Not all the stories published in the printed version appear on this site.
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NEW YORK CITY -- The unlicensed Manhattan doctor on Monday, October 15, pleaded guilty to first degree assault for killing Filipina Maria Cruz, a young New York banker, who died after he performed a botched laser surgery on her.
Dean Faiello, 47, had originally been charged with second degree murder and had faced 25 years to life in state prison.
Maria Cruz, a 35-year-old Philippine native worked at Barclay’s Capital as a financial analyst, and died at Faiello’s clinic in April, 2003, after undergoing treatment for a growth on her tongue.
Faiello admitted in Manhattan Supreme Court that when she began convulsing under an anesthetic he had administered, he failed to get her emergency medical aid.
He then stashed her body in a suitcase, sealed it in concrete in his Newark, New Jersey, home and fled to Costa Rica until he was extradited back to New York in May 2005.
Ten months after Cruz vanished, Faiello’s house was sold and Cruz’ body discovered under the concrete slab.
Faiello will be sentenced on November 2 to 20 years in state prison.
“It was pretty hard to watch. I was crying inside, although I didn’t show it,” Cruz’s father, Rodolfo, 75. said of Faiello’s admission.
Rodolfo Cruz and his wife Irenea, who just arrived from the Philippines last Sunday, October 15, to attend the hearing, said that last Monday assistant prosecutor Ann Trunti told them of a plea bargain wherein Faiello agreed to a 20-year jail term with five years probation, in exchange for a life sentence. Cruz, said the plea deal will spare him and his wife from the ordeal of a trial.
“It would be very more exhausting,” he said.
“We accepted the plea bargain because we didn’t want more pressures,” said Cruz, 74 years old.
“We have mixed emotions. We are happy that justice will be served. But we are also sad because he didn’t give our daughter a chance to live,” Cruz said.
But the father vowed to attend Faiello’s Nov. 2 sentencing, saying, “It may be the last thing I’ll ever be doing for my daughter.”
During Monday’s hearing, Justice Gregory Carro grilled Faiello about his drug use, asking, “Is it true that at that time you were addicted to cocaine and were a very heavy user?” “That’s correct,” Faiello said.
Faiello told prosecutors that Maria Cruz came to his illegal Chelsea clinic to have hair removed from her tongue. He said she suffered a seizure after he injected lidocaine into her tongue.
When Cruz fell unconscious, Faiello called a real doctor who told him to get her immediately to an emergency room. But Faiello, who was being investigated for practicing medicine without a license, ignored the advice. Faiello took Cruz’s body to his carriage house in Newark, buried her under the garage, then fled to Costa Rica.
Cruz’s body was discovered in February 2004 after cops received a tip that one of Faiello’s patients had died while in his care. Cruz, an immigrant from the Philippines, was identified through her breast implants. Faiello was nabbed in San José, Costa Rica, seven days after Cruz’s body was found.
Maria worked her way up from a low-level position at Citibank to a $180,000 -per-year job at Barclay’s Capital’s asset management.
She was known as an intelligent student and graduated with honors from Fordham University in Bronx where she received her MBA in Finance. She was on top of her class when she graduated cum laude from Maryknoll College in Manila.
Born and raised in the Philippines, Maria moved to the U.S in 1992 to work in Houston, Texas. She became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2002.
“Maria was an achiever. She went to America to give her family a better life. I cried because my daughter was so young. It’s still painful for us,” said Cruz.
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MANILA -- Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay refused to acknowledge the suspension order from the Department of the Interior and Local Government and decided to hole up at the Makati City Hall since Tuesday, October 16,
But on Thursday, The Court of Appeals has stopped the DILG from enforcing the 60-day preventive suspension against Binay.
Binay has vowed to defy the “illegal” suspension order. “They might as well kill me here, but I will never run away from this fight,” he said Tuesday. Since then, he has stayed on at the Makati City Hall, donning a military colonel’s uniform.
Binay’s supporters and sympathizers began flocking to the Makati City Hall after news about his suspension broke Tuesday, although authorities see this as no immediate cause for alarm.
The vice mayor, Ernesto Mercado, and the city council’s 16 members were also suspended for 60 days.
The suspension order was based on the complaint filed by former vice mayor Roberto Brillante.
Brillante alleged there are names in the payroll sheet that were either former employees of the city hall or nonworkers in the city government.
“Some of the ghost employees are abroad, working in other companies; some are not aware that their names are listed in the payroll sheet. We have affidavits that support their claims,” Brillante said.
Binay denied the existence of ghost employees, saying it would have been noted by the Commission on Audit.
On Wednesday morning, Vice-Mayor Ernesto Mercado opened the gates of City Hall to resume municipal operations.
Mercado also directed all city hall employees and department heads to return to work.
“I have ordered that the main door of the city hall be opened and we are business as usual here in Makati. The operation is normal but we are still suspended,” said Mercado.
He said the operations of the city should not be affected by the political turmoil, and that not all municipal transactions require the signature of the mayor, vice-mayor or councilors.
The vice mayor met with Rodolfo Feraren, DILG National Capital Region director, who had been appointed caretaker of the city, and informed him about the reopening of City Hall.
Service was disrupted the whole day Tuesday after Binay ordered all entrances to the building closed to prevent DILG Undersecretary Wence lito Andanar from serving the suspension order.
In a ruling issued by the appeals court 13th Division and which was penned by Associate Justice Enrico Lanzanas, the temporary restraining order will last for 60-days.
Other members of the division are Associate Justices Edgardo Cruz and Jose Reyes.
Binay filed a Petition for Prohibition and Mandamus to stop the Palace and the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) from enforcing the suspension order. (MNS)
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HONOLULU, Hawaii -- A powerful earthquake shook the Big Island of Hawaii on Sunday, but there have been no reports so far of Filipinos having been killed or injured in the tremor.
The magnitude 6.6 quake prompted evacuations of thousands of tourists from damaged resort hotels and residents from crumpled homes. It knocked out power as far away as Honolulu and throwing the island into a state of emergency.
Preliminary damage estimates from the earthquake hit $73 million and President Bush declared a major disaster, ordering federal aid to help state and local recovery efforts.
The earthquake — nearly as strong as the 1994 Northridge temblor — struck at 7:07 a.m. about 11 miles offshore from Kailua-Kona, a resort town on Hawaii’s popular and sunny Kona Coast. No fatalities were reported, and most of the injuries were believed to be minor.
“So far no reports of anyone [Filipino or otherwise] killed due to quake. Over here in Honolulu, no apparent damage other than no electricity and outbound flights are suspended,” said Ariel Abadilla, Philippine Consul General in Hawaii.
Abadilla said that assessments of possible structural damage to buildings and residences were underway.
“Over at Big Island, 45 minutes by plane from Honolulu where [the] quake happened, Pinoys [ colloquial term for Filipinos] had lots of things [lamps, vases, glassware, cabinets etc] toppling over and breaking in homes,” Abadilla said, adding that reports indicate road damage and loose boulders and soil in the area.
The Big Island was reported as having been nearest to the site of the earthquake and where around 40,000 Americans of Filipino descent live.
In Manila, Eduardo Malaya, spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs, said Abadilla was also trying to reach out to the Filipino-American community in Kailua Kona.
Malaya also said that Abadilla checked the Philippine consulate building on Pali Highway in Honolulu and saw that it suffered no damage, and the 13 staff members of the consulate were all safe. The tremor was so strong that it brought down the shelves and bookcases in the consulate, Malaya added.
Malaya said Filipinos of American descent comprise about 25 percent of the Hawaii population.
Filipinos, mostly from the Ilocos region, have been migrating to Hawaii since 1906. This year, the Philippines is celebrating the 100th year of the first migration of Filipino sacadas (contract farmers) who went to Hawaii to work.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. — A protégé of Sen. Panfilo Lacson and a former FBI intelligence analyst who admitted passing classified information to opposition politicians in the Philippines as part of an attempt to overthrow President Arroyo are scheduled to be sentenced within days of each other in New Jersey in December.
A spokesman for the US attorney’s office for the district of New Jersey said former PNP senior superintendent Michael Ray Aquino is scheduled to be sentenced on December 12 and former FBI man Leandro Aragoncillo on December 14 but added these dates are subject to change.
Aquino was earlier scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 30 while co-conspirator Aragoncillo, a former US Marine who worked at various times for Vice President Al Gore and Dick Cheney and pleaded guilty in May, was to have been sentenced on Aug. 14.
Aquino, who has close ties with Lacson, an opposition leader with links to deposed President Joseph Estrada, has been in federal custody since his arrest on Sept. 10, 2005 on spying charges.
He pleaded guilty last July to unlawfully possessing secret US government documents containing information relating to national defense as well as information on terrorist threats to US military personnel in the Philippines and faces a sentence of between 70 and 87 months in jail.
His lawyer will argue that lower federal sentencing guidelines of between 37 and 46 months, should apply and the final decision is up to the judge.
By pleading guilty Aquino spared himself a possible life sentence and also spared the US government a messy trial that could have highlighted weaknesses on how it guards its secrets.
Aquino, 40, admitted that he received documents and information from Aragoncillo, a Filipino-American intelligence analyst of the FBI, that contained details of threats to US military personnel in the Philippines and confidential intelligence sources and methods of the US government, the US Attorney’s office for the district of New Jersey said.
He admitted receiving documents and information from Aragoncillo from January 2005 until his arrest.
Aragoncillo pleaded guilty on May 4 this year to one count of conspiracy to transmit national defense information and another count of transmitting national defense information which carry a maximum term of life in prison.
He also pleaded guilty to two counts of unlawful retention of national defense information and unlawful use of a government computer, both of which carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
Aragoncillo said the documents he passed were like a “blueprint” on how to engineer a coup.
Aquino was a former deputy director in the Philippine National Police and was also a senior superintendent of the now-disbanded Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force.
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