Club X, Nissan X-trail Club, Philippines

X2 · Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 1:42 pm Post subject: "Dugo-dugo" Gang

Guys, a friend of mine forwarded this to me. You guys might have encountered this group before.

Last Friday, our family was victimized by the Dugo-dugo gang. Needless to say, we were caught unaware and lost a lot of our stuff. So over the weekend, while trying to deal with our loss, I came up with two major action points. The first was to channel all my energy and curse the stolen jewelries (primarily attributed to the Harry Potter book 7 craze, hehe.. J). The other was to share our experience, hoping that people will take caution and eventually render the Dugo-dugo gang modus operandi inoperable. With so many of these Dugo-Dugo gang horror stories going around I still can’t believe that people are still duped. One of our biggest mistake would be to assume that this can never happen to us. But it does happen! It happened to me, it could also happen to you! So let me share with you some of our realizations <slash> lessons learned (albeit the hard way) –

They are a well researched and persistent lot.
We have 3 unlisted phone numbers (to illustrate, let’s just use the last 2 digits of the phone numbers – 25, 57, 58.), two of which are under my mom’s name (57, 5 Cool

, while the other one (25) was in another’s name since we just acquired it from the person who used to own the lot where we are living right now. 57 is perpetually hooked up to the fax machine. 58 is for DSL and is strictly for “family” calls only. Meaning, this line is always open so that any member of our immediate family will never get a busy tone when calling home. Aside from a few close friends, we never shared this number with anyone else. Lastly, 25 is the number we give out to family and friends and to credit card applications, supermarket draws, etc.. you get the drift. Anyway, during last Friday’s incident, the first call was made through 58. However, ever since being hooked up to DSL, this line had a funny buzzing sound. As such, when our household help answered the call she had to hang up because the voice was barely audible. After a couple of minutes, 25 rang and the rest was history.

As for vouching for their persistence, our first encounter with the Dugo-dugo gang was back in 2003. They instructed our then household help to use the hammer and destroy the locks to get our valuables. Fortunately, my brother came home from school and was able to stop the whole thing from happening. Again in 2006, my mom received a call from our household help – she was a sobbing mess. Again, with luck on our side, our maid used her cellphone to verify if indeed my mom got into an accident. Well, last Friday reinforced their motto: “pag may tiyaga may nilaga” and “try and try until you succeed”.

This leads me to think that before they carry out their plans, they do some sort of profiling. Over the years, the involuntary slips that our household help makes over the phone bolster their profile list on our homes.
Example (this really happened when my mom’s friend called another friend’s house) –
Mom’s friend: “day.. asan ang ma’am mo.. si.. si.. si.. ”
Inday: “aah.. si ma’am Rosa.. ay nasa opis po eh..”
Mom’s friend: “eh un anak nalang nya.. si.. si.. si.. ”
Inday: “aah.. si Junior.. ay nasa school pa ho eh..”
Just substitute with a Dugo-dugo gang member calling instead. Bingo! Instant access to information about the names of the people in the house and their schedules!

They operate using their tried and tested formula.
First is they say one of the family members got into an accident. Based on their knowledge about your family, they drop names and say that so and so got into an accident when the car lost its brakes and one of the family members shattered his/her jaw. Then they up your panic level by saying that the hospital will not admit the person without a substantial deposit and you have to deliver the money within an hour lest he/she dies. Here’s what happened to us, the maid was told that my mom got into an accident and that she needs money immediately. “Sirain mo na ang pinto.. si ma’am na ang bahala.. kunin mo ang lahat ng pera at alahas sa naka-lock na cabinet.. bilisan mo kasi kailangan na nya ma-admit (sa hospital).”

Of course the household help will say that she doesn’t have access to any money or valuables since they are locked away. This is when they will instruct the household help to use the hammer and destroy the locks, get all the valuables and bring them to a drop off location. “What are you wearing?” “Someone sent by ma’am will approach you and get the things from you.” Based on our experience, these instructions were given in 2003, 2006 and again last Friday. Exactly the same instructions, exactly the same sequence.

Another thing to note is they will ask the household help to hang up all the phones. When our maid asked why, they said that “baka tumawag ang pulis”. Of all the stupid reasons! It should have been a dead giveaway, but let us not overestimate the reasoning abilities of someone in panic. Much more, it is hard to blame the household help of their lack in judgment. Just think of it this way, kaya nga sila pumasok na katulong dba?!

Prevention is the best precaution.
As I have mentioned, this incident is not new to us. Aside from our personal experience, we know at least 5 people who have experienced this first hand. In fact, ever since the first incident, we never failed to warn our household help about this modus operandi. Another curious detail in all this hullabaloo, is that we have a security guard who was specifically instructed NOT to let the household help out without our consent. And if ever they secured our consent, they should check the contents of whatever the household help was bringing outside with them. The most frustrating things about last Friday’s ordeal was, even with all our precautions, the lapses in judgement and protocol which cost us a whole stinkin’ lot!

So, this makes me conclude that verbal warning is not enough. If I could only turn back time, I will try to simulate the event, pretend I was a member of the Dugo-dugo gang and assess the EQ of our household help. You should try that, seriously! You can always give up the act just around when they start hammering away on your door. Worst case is you need to do a touch up job on your doors/cabinets. But at least you can make sermon to the maid long and hard enough to inculcate deep in their brains stuff that they should have learned long ago such as not talking to strangers!!!

Also, we need to be responsible and proactive about our security! Precautions are not enough, you need to prevent the bad people from getting to what you value! Invest in a high quality safe! Looking back on how many times we have attempted to buy one in Rustan’s but had different excuses like – “ang bigat naman, pano natin yan bubuhatin pababa ng car and paakyat sa kwarto?” “wag na muna, d naman yan necessity, shopping nalang tayo!” gives me a major migrane. A lot of what-ifs and sayang kung sana.. So, believe me, the amount you invest on buying one will save you a whole lot of heartaches.

We are still reeling from our loss. What breaks our heart is losing the heirloom jewelries that no amount of money can replace. For the bad guys, pera lng yan, pambili ng whatever their greedy little hearts desire. But for us, it was our family’s legacy. OA to say that we lost everything, but to us, it certainly feels that way! And I feel sick to the stomach every time my active imagination conjures images of these crooks dividing our stuff and proclaiming their success (I swear! Too much TV!!!). However, what’s important is no one was hurt. At the end of the day, we are left to deal with the hard lessons that can only make us grow stronger and wiser.

As a popular cliché goes, “walang manloloko kung walang magpapaloko”. This group of scoundrels continue to exist because people still fall for their act. I hope that you take all our learnings to heart, share it with your family and friends so that we can run them out of business. As a final note, I never want to hear from any of you that this happened to you!!!! D na sya katanggap-tanggap if that happens. The first time can be attributed to lack of experience but the next time around is pure stupidity. The first time has already come and gone for us, and indeed, we learned our lesson well. Employ vicarious learning through our experiences, I assure you that you can only benefit from it.

mikesia868 · Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 5:08 pm Post subject:

thanx x2 for sharing and reminding us of current events which may affect our lives...
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machoman · Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2009 11:01 pm Post subject: re

now ko lang nabasa ito.. tagal na pala nitong post n2.. hehe ingat nlang i hve sme friends nabiktima n2