P840,000 missing from CIDG custody

A civilian agent of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) is now being hunted by his colleagues after he allegedly ran away with P840,000 representing the cash evidence taken from a suspected Chinese drug pusher last year.

CIDG director Chief Superintendent Francisco Zubia identified the suspect as Romeo Tumaliuan, detailed with the CIDG evidence custodian's office at Camp Crame.

Zubia said that the cash evidence was only discovered missing last February 21 during a routine inventory.

Investigation showed that the cash was taken from Cay Tiang Son, a suspected drug trafficker during a drug buy-bust operation conducted by agents of the CIDG's Detection and Special Operations Office (DSOO) at the Heritage Hotel in Manila last August.

Taken from Cay were 300 grams of high-grade shabu, P715,000, HK$16,000, and P350,000 with which he allegedly tried bribe Superintendent Wenceslao Sombero, former DSOO chief.

Sombero said the money was discovered missing from the locked steel filing cabinet to which only Tumaliuan had access.

According to Sombero, the suspect apparently wanted to implicate him in the theft. However, Sombero said, the plan backfired as he had already been transferred to his new post as chief of the Regional Special Operations Office of the Southern Tagalog Police when the theft took place.

Zubia ordered the filing of administrative and criminal cases against Tumaliuan with the PNP Internal Affairs Services and the Office of the Ombudsman.