"The mere fact that they brought the two women to the house of their team leader and not to a police station showed that it was they who committed something irregular. We did not set them up," said WPD-GAS chief, Superintendent Marcelino Pedrozo.
These developed after Task Force Jerico officials filed charges of obstruction of justice against the Manila policemen, whom they claimed, arrested their agents in an attempt to protect a colleague allegedly involved in illegal gambling.
In a press statement, the DILG revealed it filed anti-illegal gambling raps against WPD policeman PO3 Bonifacio Abad, said to be the maintainer of the illegal horse race bookies operation in Sta. Ana, and his daughter Michelle del Mundo and Rose Martinez whom the Jericho operatives said they arrested last Sunday.
The DILG statement said Task Force Jerico members SPO1 Jesus Acejo, PO2 Ricardo Luciano Jr. and POs1 Danilo Hamila, Fred Fara-on and Manolito Prado testified that the Manila policemen arrested them for alleged robbery-extortion despite properly coordinating their anti-illegal gambling operation in Sta. Ana with WPD authorities.
They claimed the operatives arrested them when they did not grant the "request" of Abad for the Task Force Jericho to release his daughter Del Mundo, and her companion Martinez who were arrested while in the act of conducting illegal bookie operations.
"The arrest made by the WPD operatives was a blatant attempt to block our effort to file appropriate charges against the suspected illegal gambling personnel we’ve arrested and to stop us from pursuing our anti-gambling operations in that particular area," the group claimed.
Last Monday, Pedrozo said the Manila policemen arrested the DILG agents in an entrapment operation in Sta. Ana, Manila for allegedly abducting Del Mundo and Martinez and demanding P10,000 from their relatives in exchange for their release.
According to the WPD, prior to the arrest of the DILG agents, Abad, of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG), and Evangeline Lim, Del Mundo’s father and cousin, filed a complaint against a certain PO2 Ferdinand Sulpico and several others allegedly assigned with the DILG Task Force Jericho.
In her complaint, Evangeline said Sulpico called her and informed her of the arrest of Del Mundo and Martinez for allegedly operating a bookies joint last Sunday along Eloriaga Street in San Andres Bukid in Manila.
Police said Del Mundo’s relatives were informed by Sulpico through text messaging that the two women were being held at a house along Iridium Street in Sta. Ana, Manila. Police said that Sulpico, through text messaging, allegedly demanded P10,000 for the release of the two women and that the money be given before the end of the day’s horse races at 10 p.m.
Based on the complaint, Manila police then prepared to conduct an entrapment with the use of marked P10,000 cash. The policemen then went to 2448 Iridium Street where the two women were being held. After receiving the marked money, the agents were arrested and disarmed.
Police later rescued the two at the garage of the house, which was later learned to be the house of Acejo, alleged team leader of the agents. Though the agents were arrested and the two women were rescued, the policemen failed to recover the marked money.
According to Pedrozo, Hamila, passed the marked money to his wife after receiving it. Charges for robbery and extortion were filed yesterday against the arrested agents before the Manila City Prosecutor’s Office. — Mike Frialde