Holdup man gets 17-year jail term

This vicious robber’s humiliation is now complete.

A Manila court has sentenced last week to as much as 17 years in jail a holdup man who desperately submerged himself in a stinking cesspool six years ago to escape lawmen, only to find moments later that his pursuers were idly waiting for him when he finally surfaced, gasping for air.

Laguyo was found guilty of robbery with serious physical injuries by Manila Judge Perfecto Laguio, along with his accomplice Burnan Baguilan, for the June 14, 1995 supermarket robbery on Hidalgo street, Quiapo, Manila.

Their accomplice was shot dead by responding cops while Laguyo and Baguilan were wounded in the ensuing shootout with police.

Adding to Laguyo’s woes was the fact that Baguilan was acquitted of the additional illegal possession of firearms charge, while he was convicted since police managed to recover his caliber .45 pistol which he had left at the bottom of the murky estero. The lawmen recovered the firearm by hiring a boy to retrieve it for them.

Prior to the shootout, Laguyo, Baguilan, and their unidentified cohort shot the supermart’s security guard on their way in and pumped into the latter three more bullets when they found him weakly crawling on the pavement on their way out. The suspects carted away the supermart’s cash register containing P1,000.

The guard survived the four bullets he took.

Policemen from a nearby police station responded to the successive gunshots and engaged the escaping trio in a shootout. Baguilan was wounded and captured in the initial volley of gunfire while Laguyo was later hit in the leg.

Wounded, tired, and his third companion already dead in the running gunbattle, Laguyo jumped into the cesspool thinking that he could hide. According to Laguio’s five-page decision, "the police simply waited for him to surface for air and then arrested him."

The accused denied the charges, claiming they were mere pedestrians hit by stray bullets, but this was not given much credence by the court in the face of the positive identification by the guard of his attackers and that of the arresting lawmen.

The court acquitted Baguilan of the charge of illegal possession of firearms because of the prosecution’s failure to allege that the caliber .38 revolver seized from him "was not licensed or registered in his name." – Jose Aravilla