NCRPO cop tagged in Caloocan robberies

MANILA, Philippines - A National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) policeman, who allegedly led six unidentified men in robbing three people in Caloocan City Tuesday morning, has a string of administrative and criminal cases at the police legal office and in local courts, a police official said yesterday.

Chief Superintendent Samuel Pagdilao Jr., Northern Police District director, said Police Officer 3 Elpidio Manding, now assigned at the NCRPO’s regional police administrative unit and holding center, has pending administrative and criminal cases for “robbery, grave threats with robbery and absence without leave.”

“Manding is also facing criminal charges before the local courts and I have been urging the NCRPO legal office to give priority to his pending administrative cases for its early resolution,” Pagdilao told The STAR.

Manding is still undergoing summary dismissal proceedings at the NCRPO, he said.

Manding, a former member of the Police Community Precinct 14 of the Caloocan City police but was transferred to the NCRPO two months ago because of his pending cases, was tagged in the robbery of the Edralin Building along Congressional Road in Barangay 171, Caloocan City North at around 3 a.m. Tuesday.

Manding reportedly led at least six other men armed with handguns into the building and tied up its three occupants – Mel Pangilinan, 31, Michael Verdadero, 20, the building’s caretaker, and Florentino Bajao, 50 – using masking tape.

The armed men took a mobile phone worth P22,000, a wristwatch valued at around 12,000, a P7,500 DVD player and Pangilinan’s wallet containing P1,200 cash and important documents. The suspects also beat up the victims before fleeing.

Edna Edralin, 54, owner of the robbed building, told The STAR Manding was getting back at her after she evicted the policeman last March from her building for “reckless behavior.”

“Tuesday’s case was the second time that Manding robbed my building, the first was a few days after he left,” Edralin said.

Senior Superintendent Jude Santos, Caloocan City police chief, said robbery with physical injury charges were filed Wednesday before the Caloocan City prosecutor’s office against Manding and his cohorts.

“We will just wait for the court’s issuance of his warrant of arrest so that we could apprehend him,” Santos said.

Santos, in an April 2009 report to Pagdilao, said Manding reportedly took IFP Manufacturing Corp. receipts from a truck driver after he allegedly failed to extort money from the driver last December.

Manding was also charged for allegedly illegally detaining a man for urinating in a public place, firing his gun twice near the victim’s ear and robbing him of his motorcycle tools last August.

“As gleaned from the records, (Manding) is a scalawag, (a) misfit whose actions not only seriously compromised the image of the Caloocan police in particular but also tainted the image of the (police) in general,” Santos said in his report.

He added that Manding skipped a six-month retraining program for backsliding police officers and he has been declared absent without leave.