Missing Bilibid inmate claims he escaped by disguising himself as a visitor

MANILA, Philippines — The missing inmate of the New Bilibid Prison — initially presumed dead, then recaptured by police somewhere in Rizal — had allegedly escaped the maximum security facility by pretending to be a visitor, according to authorities.

The chief of the Angono Municipal police station chief said in an interview with Radyo 630 that Michael Cataroja claimed he had timed his escape from the NBP by slipping out during visitation hours.

“He said just walked casually out of the maximum security area. He simply went along with a visitor. Supposedly, it was visiting day, so he just tagged along,” Police Major Lauro Leyva Moratillo said in Filipino.

Cataroja has been missing since July and was previously thought to have been decapitated, according to information cited by Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, but he later said it was “fake news.” 

A search involving trained dogs had found a bone inside a septic tank at the maximum security compound of the national penitentiary. While authorities initially thought this belonged to Cataroja, representatives from the National Bureau of Investigation later bared during a House hearing that the bone came from a chicken, not human remains.  

This led authorities to turn their search outside the NBP. Cataroja was rearrested on Thursday by Angono police.

Moratillo said that the missing person deprived of liberty (PDL) had even created a fake stamp mark for visitors using a ballpoint pen to make his escape easier. Cataroja then allegedly walked all the way from New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa to Cainta.

But Moratillo does not buy Cataroja’s account of how he escaped, saying that the NBP imposes tight security protocols on all inmates. 

Cataroja has been missing since July 15.

"We don't believe it because we know it's a maximum security area. The security is very tight, and there are many gates he would have to pass through," he said.

Bureau of Corrections Director General Gregorio Catapang has ordered an investigation into how the PDL was able to sneak out of the compound.