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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 sentencing of Dean Faiello, who pleaded guilty to the murder of Filipina banker Maria “Pipay” Cruz, was adjourned until December 4.
Police say Faiello hid the body, fled the country before returning and confessing to her death.
Officials from the Department of Corrections will investigate whether time already served behind bars by Faiello can be computed into his sentence.
The father of Cruz, who was supposed to face Faiello on Thursday, November 2, said he has waited three years for justice and can wait another month.
Dean Faiello, the construction worker who passed himself off as a dermatologist in Chelsea, was caught in Costa Rica and brought back to New York last year.
Since then, he’s pleaded guilty to impersonating a doctor.
Thanks to a plea deal, Faiello was supposed to get a sentence of 20 years in prison in connection with the April 2003 death of Cruz, a 35-year-old Manhattan banker.
She had gone to Faiello for a lunchtime laser treatment. But she went into convulsions and died when he allegedly injected her tongue with lidocaine.
Faiello admits he did nothing to help Cruz. And he ended up burying her body under a home he owned in Newark.
Ten months passed before a tip led police to the body, and to Faiello who by then was working as a dancer at a bar in Costa Rica.
Faiello admitted to being a heavy cocaine user at the time of the assault and was originally charged with murder, but the plea deal reduced the charge to first degree assault.
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.
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LAS VEGAS -- The United States district court in Nevada has postponed the extradition hearing of Charlie “Atong” Ang for the fourth time pending the arrival of Philippine authorities who will fetch the Chinese Filipino businessman.
The hearing was supposed to determine when US marshals will turn over custody of Ang to the National Bureau of Investigation.
The report said that a 45-minute closed door meeting was called before the resumption of the hearing because the NBI officials have not yet arrived. The details of the meeting were not revealed to the media, it added.
The report said that Deputy Director for Regional Operations Service Reynaldo Esmeralda is scheduled to arrive in the US Thursday evening. Upon the arrival of the NBI officials, talks with the US marshals will begin regarding the extradition proceedings.
Ang and his family were relieved after the hearing was postponed again, the report added.
Ang remains under house arrest while his extradition case is being heard. The US court allowed this arrangement because it believed that the businessman is not a flight risk.
On Monday, it was reported that two NBI officials will fly to the US Thursday to pick up Ang, who has been ordered extradited by a US court.
According to an NBI official, who asked not to be named, Ang will be escorted back by Esmeralda and Interpol Division chief Claro de Castro Jr. on November 10 or 11.
The report added that reliable sources at the Department of Foreign Affairs said the US State Department has sent a diplomatic note, dated October 6, asking the Philippine government to immediately arrange the repatriation of Ang, not later than November 11.
It was said that the State Department warned that failure of the Philippine government to bring back Ang after November 11 would give US authorities no choice but to grant Ang’s petition to be released from custody.
A US District Court in Nevada had earlier ordered the arrest and detention of Ang upon a petition by the Department of Justice.
In a decision last September 11, the court said Ang could be extradited to the Philippines.
Ang, a co-accused of ousted President Joseph Estrada in plunder charges before the Sandiganbayan, did not seek a review of the US court’s decision.
Ilocos Sur Gov. Luis “Chavit” Singson accused Ang of being Estradaís bagman for payoffs from operators of the illegal numbers game jueteng.
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CHICAGO, Illinois – Wooing the potent block of Filipino American voters in California in his re-election bid in the November 8 special election, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger fired off two letters to President Bush and Rep. James Sensenbrenner, House Judiciary committee chairman, seeking their support for passage of a pending bill in the House of Representatives granting special visas for immediate relatives of Filipino World War II veterans.
Part of Schwarzenegger’s letter toPresident Bush and Representative Sensenbrenner ( R-WI- 5th) read:
“During World War II, more than 200,000 Filipino soldiers fought beside American troops to restore liberty and democracy to their homeland in the war against Japan.
“The bravery and sacrifice of these Filipino veterans contributed to our victory in World War II. While the Immigration Act of 1990 allowed these Filipino veterans the opportunity to become citizens of the United States, the law did not extend this benefit to their adult sons and daughters, many of whom have been on immigration waiting lists for several years.
“With just 6,000 Filipino World War II veterans still alive in the United States , I ask you to join me in supporting House Resolution 901. This bill would give priority in the issuance of immigrant visas to the sons and daughters of Filipino World War II veterans who are naturalized citizens of the United States . Given that the youngest of these veterans are in their eighties, reuniting these families are particularly important.
“The United States has a proud tradition of recognizing the sacrifices made by our veterans. House Resolution 901 is our opportunity to recognize and reward the remarkable courage and dedication of the Filipino-American veterans who fought for our country during World War II.”
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MANILA -- The Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools (CGFNS International) has issued a statement about the eligibility of Filipino nurses who passed the June 2006 NLE, which could mean their VisaScreen applications will be denied.
The CGFNS statement says: “Any VisaScreen applications that CGFNS receives from June 2006 passers will be accepted but deferred for a final decision until this assessment process is complete. If the assessment concludes that the license is not comparable, the VisaScreen application from a June 2006 passer will be denied.”
The assessment process will determine if the Professional Regulation Commission exam that the June 2006 examinees passed is “comparable” to that of an American licensure exam.
If found to be not “comparable”—for instance, because the grades were manipulated by the PRC or the test scores for some subjects such as the leakage-tainted Tests 3 and 5 were given recomputed values—then the Filipino nurse of batch June 2006 NLE will not be given a VisaScreen certification. The full statement reads:
“The Board of Trustees of the Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools (CGFNS International) met on October 22-23, 2006. They considered whether Philippine nurses who have passed the Philippine Professional Regulation Commission’s June 2006 nursing licensing exam are eligible for VisaScreen Certification.
“The Board directed its staff and counsel to review and assess whether the licensure process followed in light of the challenged results of the leakage-tainted June 2006 exam is ‘comparable’ with that required for nurses licensed in America, as required by US law. The CGFNS will then make a final determination of whether passers of the June 2006 exam are eligible for VisaScreen® certification. The CGFNS expects to reach a final decision on the question of comparability in the near future.”
This means the CGFNS will now study the whole process by which the PRC and the Court of Appeals decided on who has become a properly qualified licensed nurse among the June 2006 examinees.
This will affect the future of the June 2006 nursing board exam passers who wish to work in the United States. They need the VisaScreen to get a visa from the US Embassy.
Even if — without the CGFNS VisaScreen certificate — they get to enter the USA and work there as a nurse and finally want to apply for an immigrant visa, they will need to show their VisaScreen certificate.
This is because the CGFNS is the only organization authorized by the US government’s Department of Homeland Security to certify foreign-born nurses and other health-care workers.
US Immigration law requires that health-care professionals, other than physicians, complete a screening program in order to qualify for certain occupational visas. VisaScreen, a program offered by the International Commission on Health-care Professions (ICHP), a division of CGFNS, enables health-care professionals to meet this requirement by verifying and evaluating their credentials to ensure that they meet the government’s minimum eligibility standards. The CGFNS is named in federal law as a qualified provider of such a screening program.
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