BI bars 3 foreign sex offenders from entering PH

INQUIRER file photo / ALEXIS CORPUZ

MANILA, Philippines — The Bureau of Immigration (BI) on Thursday said it barred three more foreign sex offenders at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia).

According to Immigration chief Norman Tansingco, the three were intercepted at the NAIA Terminal 1 in the first week of April upon arrival.

READ: BI bars entry of 150 sex offenders

The first foreigner was identified as Jeffrey William Jewitt, 42, who was denied entry on April 5 upon his arrival aboard a Korean Airlines flight from Incheon, South Korea.

Based on information from the BI’s border control and intelligence unit (BCIU), Jewitt was convicted of sex offenses in 2012 by a court in Illinois and was convicted on two counts of child abduction and sexually luring a 16-year-old girl and one count of sexual exploitation of a 12-year-old child.

The other foreigner was American Charles David James Weatherall, 32, who was barred from entering the country on April 7 after arriving in an Air China flight from Beijing.

Weatherall, said the BCIU, was convicted of child pornography for possessing indecent images of children in the United Kingdom.

On April 8, American Momodu Wurie Jalloh, 28, was also intercepted upon arriving in a Saudia Airlines flight from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

READ: Immigration bars 3 sex offenders from entering PH 

Momodu, based on interpol records, was convicted in Virginia for aggravated sexual assault through incapacitation of a 21-year-old woman.

Tansingco explained that under the immigration act, aliens convicted of crimes involving moral turpitude are automatically barred from entering the country.

“As gatekeepers of the country, immigration officers are chiefly responsible for seeing to it that unwanted aliens are immediately turned away upon arriving in any of our international ports of entry,” Tansingco said in a statement.

The three were also immediately included in the immigration blacklist after their arrival.