The Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) and National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) conducted training sessions to frontline staff of PRC so they can be vigilant against fake documents issued by suspected unscrupulous persons wanting to have professional licenses.
NBI Supervising Document Examiner Eliodoro Constantino stressed that fake, fraudulent or tampered documents may include forged transcript of records and other certificates.
“It’s what you call a white collar crime. Somebody can be misrepresented by someone else,” he said during the two-day seminar which began August 19 at the PRC auditorium in Sampaloc, Manila .
Constantino said preventive and control measures can be done against questionable documents and forgery. The veteran NBI agent gave pointers during the seminar dubbed as “Questioned Documents Examination and Forgery Detection Seminar.”
PRC Commissioner Nilo L. Rosas, who gave the opening remarks, said fraud is as old as history. “According to history, Roman Emperor Titus and Roman Gladiator Mark Anthony were the first known forgers,” he said.
“The Philippines had its share of problems with fraud. The PRC and the Department of Education (DepEd) had their share of such cases,” said Commissioner Rosas, who was Education Undersecretary from 1998 to 2000.
DepEd and PRC have had such fraudulent cases over the years wherein both government agencies have to cancel certificates of some people who faked their transcripts and other official documents.
A classic case is that of fake marine engineer who was also caught with fake school records and birth certificate. The suspect’s wife became confused if the man she married was an impostor.
“Forgery undermines the competency of the different professions. And so, this seminar is the first step on how to detect fraudulent documents,” Commissioner Rosas said.
Constantino delved on the mechanics of handwriting identification, detection of fraud through signatures, and in-depth study of actual alterations of documents.
According to Constantino, a traced forgery is the result of an attempt to transfer to a fraudulent document an exact facsimile of a genuine signature which was executed by actually following the outline of a genuine signature with a writing instrument.
Participants will be able to detect if the signatures on the documents is genuine and if the document is forged.
Source: prc.gov.ph
Link: http://www.prc.gov.ph/articles.asp?sid=4&aid=2699
