PNP official to testify in KB rubout?

A ranking official of the Philippine National Police (PNP) has expressed the intention of bolstering the claims of two new witnesses that top officials of the defunct Presidential Anti-Crime Commission (PACC) were involved in the rubout of 11 Kuratong Baleleng gang members along Commonwealth Avenue in Quezon City in 1995.

According to reliable sources, the senior police official would testify in court that the 11 KB members were indeed killed on orders of Chief Superintendent Francisco Zubia in front of Task Force Habagat chief Panfilo Lacson and Chief Superintendent Romeo Acop.

"He will once and for all implicate the top PACC officials in the rubout," the police source said. The police officer has prepared an affidavit that would pin down the 26 police officials, including Lacson, Acop and Zubia.

There were originally 98 policemen from Camp Crame and police district offices who were implicated in the incident, but only 26 were charged before Quezon City regional trial court judge Wenceslao Agnir, who dismissed the case due to lack of evidence four years ago.

In a sworn statement, Senior Inspector Ismael Yu earlier said he was part of the operation that led to the arrest of eight of the 11 gang members in a raid in Sun Valley Subdivision, Parañaque at midnight of May 17, 1995.

Chief Inspector Abelardo Ramos, who was with the Traffic Management Group, was tasked to bring the arrested suspects to the Philippine National Police (PNP) headquarters in Camp Crame. When he reported to Zubia there, Ramos received orders in front of Acop and Lacson, to kill the gang members.

According to Ramos, he and three other policemen peppered one of the two vans carrying the Kuratong Baleleng members with Armalite bullets, before they threw the long firearms into the van with the dead bodies.

FLAG lawyer Arno Sanidad expressed hope that the statements of the new suspects can stand up in court against the real killers of the dreaded Kuratong Baleleng members. – Christina Mendez