Don’t single me out in lifestyle check — Valera

BANGUED, Abra — Embattled Gov. Vicente Valera challenged yesterday authorities not to single him out in the lifestyle check being conducted among local government executives in the province.

In an interview, Valera, who was accused of funding the December killing of Abra Rep. Luis Bersamin Jr., claimed his in-laws, not him, own the houses that Task Force Bersamin has been looking into.

"There is a mayor in this province whose town is only a fifth-class municipality, but this town mayor has a fleet of expensive cars, mansions and a company of private armed goons," Valera pointed out.

Valera, who has both served as governor and congressman for the past 20 years, is facing a lifestyle check to give the government details on his reported unexplained wealth, Senior Superintendent Benjamin delos Santos, Criminal Investigation and Detection Group high-profile crime division chief, earlier said.

But Delos Santos clarified that this was not connected with the killing of Bersamin in Quezon City last Dec. 16.

Delos Santos said the lifestyle check was in compliance with an agreement among local government officials in Abra signed in 2005.

Valera, whom police stopped while traveling in his P1.695-million Chevrolet Suburvan without a license plate and with a siren blaring, was arrested after officers found him in possession of unlicensed firearms and a grenade.

He and his bodyguards were eventually charged with illegal possession of firearms. They later posted bail.

Tortured?

Meanwhile, relatives of Rufino Panday, now in police custody after he was arrested in connection with the Bersamin slay, appealed yesterday to Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Oscar Calderon and the Human Rights Commission to help him prove his claim that he was mentally and physically tortured by policemen while he was in detention, and that he was forced to confess and implicate "innocent people" like Valera in the murder case.

Relatives of Panday from La Paz town, who requested that their names be withheld for fear of reprisal, asked the media to relay to Calderon and the HRC their plea to investigate the police captors of Panday.