Senator Risa Hontiveros has once said that she is a favorite among fake news sites, given how many fictional stories have been written about her. And this time, the most recent hoax about her allegedly involved her cousin, who was arrested for conducting an online pyramid scam.
[ads2]
The said story has been shared by Duterte fan pages on Facebook, even earning almost 2,200 shares when it was posted by “President Duterte Supporters” and over 1,600 shares after it was shared by “Rodrigo Duterte ‘Disisais.’”
[50_50_first]
[/50_50_first][50_50_second]
[/50_50_second]
It was also shared by other Duterte fan pages, such as “Duterte Phenomenon” and “Byaheng Duterte.”
[50_50_first]
[/50_50_first][50_50_second]
[/50_50_second]
The story actually came from the noted fake news site Okd2.com, although it was picked up by blogs such as pinoythinking.online, pinoyviralnews.com, and duterteworld.com.
[ads1]
Hontiveros’ cousin, a certain Dioscoro Hontiveros and his wife, Jasmin Pasco Hontiveros, were nabbed for collecting over 54 million pesos in an online pyramid scam, the story said. The couple was said to have been in NBI’s wanted list for more than six months until their arrest in Santiago City, Isabela. The Hontiveros couple was alleged to have collected P20,000 to P60,000 per victim while promising a 10% return on investment per week. The scam started in September 2016 but they disappeared a month later, which led the victims to go to the Quezon City Police in November 2016. There were 300 victims, who gave the couple P54 million.
Six of their victims positively identified Dioscoro and his wife as the scammers, which is why they are now charged with multiple counts of syndicated estafa.
Okd2.com described Dioscoro as Senator Hontiveros’ first cousin, who used to be employed at the Farmer’s Market in Cubao before he started the scam. He was also said to have been a labor leader and was tagged in robbery cases from 2010 to 2014.
However, Okd2.com has proved once again to be a good fake storyteller.
We could not find any reports about a certain Dioscoro Hontiveros involved in a pyramid scam that victimized 300 people. It was made up by the fake news site!
Unfortunately, the hoax seemed to have worked, based on the angry comments against Hontiveros.
[50_50_first]
[/50_50_first][50_50_second]
[/50_50_second]
Okd2.com seemed to have paid special attention to Hontiveros, given how many fake stories it has written about the senator. These include the hoaxes about how Hontiveros sought a salary increase for rallyists, went on a hunger strike to protest Marcos’ hero’s burial, tried to remove Marcos’ name from Philippine history books, and wanted to raise senior citizens’ age qualification to 65 years old.
Be Informed. Beat the Trolls, Share the Truth!
[ads3]
