BIR hits wealthy heir from Makati’s Dasmariñas Village with tax fraud

A wealthy heir is facing charges of tax evasion and the Pasay City Registrar of Deeds for making the offense difficult to detect, the Bureau of Internal Revenue said Thursday. The bureau filed before the Department of Justice one count each of willful attempt to evade payment of estate tax and willful attempt to evade payment of documentary stamp tax. Pasay City Registrar of Deeds Robert Guillermo, the BIR claimed, failed to affix the Certificate Authorizing Registration on Transfer Certificate of Title for a property along Roxas Boulevard, which decreased the probability of detecting the fraudulent transaction. In Thursday’s filing, BIR Commissioner Kim Henares charged Juan Miguel Ongsiako for allegedly taking part in the sale and transfer of ownership — to him — of a parcel of land owned by the Estate of Oscar Ongsiako. The transaction was supposedly designed to evade payment of the corresponding estate tax. Henares, representing the bureau, also charged Ongsiako with “one count of willful attempt to evade or defeat payment of capital gains tax (CGT), and one count of willful failure to file a CGT return." Juan Miguel, a resident of Dasmariñas Village in Makati City, is the son of Oscar and Nori Ongsiako. According to the BIR complaint, heir Ongsiako failed to pay taxes on a P10-million transaction involving the sale and transfer of ownership of an 870-sqm property along Roxas Boulevard. The transfer was done on Oct. 25, 2005. However, the BIR said, “Juan Miguel’s father, Oscar R. Ongsiako, died on May 22, 1995 but the sale of his property to his son, Juan Miguel, was done by his wife, Nori Ongsiako, with the supposed conformity of her deceased husband whose signature was also on the deed of sale." The bureau claimed the sale was concluded between Nori and Juan Miguel as part of a scheme to transfer the assets of Oscar Ongsiako without paying estate tax and filing the required estate tax return, making Juan Miguel also liable for violating section 253 of the National Internal Revenue Code of the Philippines on willfully aiding and abetting tax evasion. The BIR has computed Juan Miguel’s total tax liability at P10.06 million. — VS, GMA News