MANILA — Local police on Tuesday arrested a fugitive CNMI lawyer in Santa Barbara, Pangasinan province, north of Manila.
Joseph Arriola, 42, has been indicted in the CNMI for various non-bailable offenses, including multiple counts of wire fraud and money laundering.
Acting on an information from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation that Arriola was hiding somewhere in Santa Barbara, local police formed tracker teams to search for the lawyer.
After a briefing with the FBI on Monday evening, the teams conducted stakeout operations in Arriola’s reported hiding place — house number 104 in Cablong villafe.
A breakthrough came at about 10 p.m. on the same evening when police received a tip from a member of the village intelligence network that Arriola’s fiancée, Juvie Cerveza, lives in Botao village, which is about three miles away from Cablong.
On the following day, police officers who pretended to be U.S. Embassy officials looking for Cerveza to verify information relating to her application for an American visa went directly to her house.
She was not there, but a man appearing to be curious about the visa application, and who later turned out to be Arriola, told the police officers to come inside the house.
After several minutes of exchanging pleasantries and small talk, and now convinced that the man was indeed the CNMI fugitive, the police officers gave a signal to personnel of the Bureau of Immigration and Deportation who came in and arrested Arriola.
The immigration personnel were earlier contacted to arrest Arriola for violation of Philippine immigration laws.
Arriola did not resist.
His passport was earlier revoked by the U.S. Department of Justice for being the subject of a warrant of arrest.
