Cops to question Australian on trader’s killing

Police are set to question an Australian trader following reports that his business partner’s killing was related to their feud.

"We have strong suspicion that Robert Freeman is the only person who has strong motive to kill his partner, Frederick Rodd," Chief Inspector Alejandro Yanquiling Jr., who heads the homicide section of the Manila Police District, told The STAR.

He said the police have already interviewed several Australian friends of the two men, who pointed out that Freeman is "a shrewd manipulator."

Their Australian friends refer to 60-year-old Freeman as a "professional conman" who has been involved in money laundering in several Australian banks, Yanquiling said.

An autopsy conducted on Rodd, 55, showed he was "murdered," contrary to earlier reports that he died of natural causes. Rodd was discovered dead along a narrow hallway in front of his room at Slouch Hat Pub and Inn along M.H. del Pilar in Ermita, Manila last Monday.

Freeman, who occupied another room at the inn, told police that his partner was suffering from diabetes and "could had suffered a heart attack."

However, an autopsy on Rodd’s body showed he sustained a "fracture on the cranial cavity (skull)" caused by a blunt instrument.

"We have reason to believe that he was murdered," Yanquiling said, adding that there is no way for Rodd to sustain the head injury as a result of a fall since the hallway was too narrow, and the walls could cushion the impact if he really lost consciousness.

He said the police had gathered information that Rodd gave Freeman A$186,000 last February in Sydney, Australia for the ownership of the Slouch Hat Pub and Inn in Ermita, Manila.

However, when the two Australians traveled to the Philippines, Rodd learned that he still does not own the pub. Rodd’s discovery resulted in a bitter quarrel between the two. Pub habitues also saw the two men in heated verbal altercations on several occasions.

Rodd was reportedly planning to expose Freeman’s illicit business dealings to the local media prior to his death, Yanquiling said.

Another Australian, Noel Smith, 55, a former stockholder of the pub, told police that Freeman has been ‘laundering money" in several banks in Brisbane, Australia.

Yanquiling is seeking the assistance of Federal Agent Kurt Plummer, senior liaison officer of the Australian Embassy in Makati City, to get in touch with a number of Australians who can provide additional information against Freeman’s reported illegal practices.

Yanquiling has also requested Tracey Batterbury, the Australian Embassy’s consular section chief, to send a representative to the medico-legal office of the Philippine National Police in Camp Crame to identify the cadaver of Rodd so an autopsy report can be issued.

Yanquiling said he will look into Freeman’s businesses to determine whether he has violated any law in the Philippines. — Nestor Etolle