Suspect in journalist's killing found dead

BAYOMBONG, Nueva Vizcaya, Philippines – One of five suspects charged for the killing of a Kalinga-based journalist was found dead last Tuesday before the court could issue a warrant of arrest against the suspects. 

Chief Inspector Glen Ganpac, police chief of Tabuk City in Kalinga, said that Lando Bilog, the alleged gunman of slain broadcaster Jose Daguio of dzRK Radyo Natin-Kalinga, was found dead along the remote Isabela-Kalinga border.

Bilog, along with Edmund Bilog, Willy Bilog, Daldin Guilawan and Edgar Guilawan, were charged with murder in connection with the July 4 slay of 75-year-old Daguio, who was also a member of the Kalinga media board at the time of his death.

“We suspect that (Lando) Bilog was finished off somewhere in Isabela and that his body was merely dumped along the boundary to confuse investigators,” Ganipac said.

Ganipac said that the suspect’s death could be a result of a love triangle gone wrong. He did not elaborate, pending results of their follow up investigation.

However, authorities could not discount the possibility that Bilog’s killing was also related to Daguio’s slay.

Bilog died even as the court was set to release the arrest warrants against him and his four other alleged cohorts, police said.

Daguio, the first journalist killed under the month-old Aquino administration, was shot in the chest with a shotgun while the victim was inside his house in Barangay Tuga, Tabuk City.

Reports said that Daguio angered the suspects after he obtained information in connection with their alleged involvement in cattle rustling in Kalinga.