Inside job eyed in security agency owner’s rob-slay

MANILA, Philippines - The killing of a security agency owner in a robbery in Caloocan City last Friday may have been an inside job, police said yesterday. 

Alonzo Hormigas Jr., 47, owner of Silver Security Agency, was on his way home and driving his pick-up truck with his wife Leonie, 48, and her brother Joseph Ramirez, 52, as passengers when four armed men clad in black jackets and bonnets blocked their path at the corner of A. del Mundo street and 4th Avenue at past 8 p.m., said Chief Inspector Ilustre Mendoza, assistant city police chief.

Hormigas stepped on the brakes as the men opened fire. He was declared dead on arrival at the Chinese General Hospital from several gunshot wounds while his wife and brother-in-law were unscathed.

The assailants then walked casually toward the left back seat and took Leonie’s bag containing the security agency’s payroll money and sped away, Mendoza said. 

“We learned that the wife had incurred so much debt from different people. There were also questions as to why the ‘robbers’ knew exactly where the money was kept,” he told The STAR.

Leonie and her brother were invited for questioning at the Caloocan police headquarters yesterday morning and Mendoza had their mobile phones confiscated. 

Leonie told probers they lost at least P3 million to the robbers. Mendoza said investigators will check the bank where Hormigas had withdrawn the payroll money to determine if he had indeed taken out P3 million.