MANILA, Philippines — The chief of the Philippine National Police, Gen. Guillermo Eleazar, on Wednesday said the organization will fully cooperate with the National Bureau of Investigation's probe into the alleged kidnapping of three persons by Manila cops.
Eleazar said the case stemmed from allegations made by two kidnapping suspects that it was actually policemen behind the abduction of 23-year-old Rexcell John Hipolito, 21-year-old Ronald Jae Dizon, and 18-year-old Ivan Serrano.
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The two kidnapping suspects are brothers who claim that they are police assets who pinpoint drug offenders to the police and that they identified the three kidnap victims as marijuana peddlers, Eleazar added. They further claimed that they were with the policemen when they took the three already-dead victims from their neighborhood in Sta. Cruz, Manila, last April.
The brothers are in the custody of the NBI, Eleazar said, adding that they might be placed under the government’s witness protection program.
"Seryosong alegasyon po ito na dapat nating tutukan (This is a serious allegation that we must pay attention to)," the country's top cop said. "But at this point, let us allow the investigation of the NBI to take its course at huwag po muna sana nating agad husgahan ang ating kapulisan (and let's not judge our police right away)."
"I assure you that once it is proven that someone made a mistake among our ranks, we will not let it slide," he added in Filipino.
When he took over leadership of the PNP last month, Eleazar vowed an aggressive internal cleansing program to crack down on dirty cops.
But a string of cases involving killer cops — taking the lives of an elderly woman, a teen with special needs and even other members of the police force — has rights groups questioning Eleazar's promises less than two months into his tenure.
— Bella Perez-Rubio with reports from Franco Luna