By Satiman Jamin

JOHOR BARU: A secret door that was camouflaged as a mirror to evade the long arm of the law did not do the trick when 15 Filipino guest relation officers (GROs) were nabbed by an enforcement team from the Immigration Department at Taman Nusa Bestari early on Sunday morning.

In the 2am raid, workers at the entertainment outlet rushed to shut the main door to a first floor room when they saw the Immigration officers arriving but reopened it after the officers knocked on the door for about 10 minutes.

Johor Immigration Department deputy chief Masri Adol said the workers acted as if nothing was amiss when they reopened the door but the officers suspected something when they found women's handbags at the counter in the outlet.

He said one of his officers then accidentally leaned on a huge mirror in the room, revealing a secret room behind it.

"We arrested 15 Filipino women who were huddling in the small room behind the mirror as they were found to have abused their social visit pass to work as GROs."

Masri said the raid was part of "Ops Sayang" to nab foreigners who violated Immigration laws and worked in entertainment outlets in the city.

"Apart from the Filipino women, we arrested five Indonesians and Vietnamese at two other entertainment outlets."

The two entertainment outlet owners had been remanded for four days to assist in investigations.