'NBI agent' loses guns over threat to fiscal

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine National Police (PNP) has seized the firearms of a businessman who allegedly claimed to be a National Bureau of Investigation agent and threatened to kill Cavite Provincial Prosecutor Emmanuel Velasco, a son of former NBI director Epimaco Velasco.

The Cavite provincial police, led by Senior Superintendent John Bulalacao, confiscated 10 high-powered firearms from the house of Victor Murillo in Tanza, Cavite on Sept. 27, the same day the PNP-Firearms and Explosives Office head Chief Superintendent Raul Petrasanta revoked the licenses and permits to carry these firearms – a .45-caliber pistol, an AK-47 rifle, two Armalite rifles, two shotguns, a .357 revolver, two .40-caliber pistols, and a Glock .40 pistol.

“The right to bear is a mere statutory privilege, not a constitutional right. All licenses may be revoked or rescinded by executive action,” he said.    

The Cavite prosecutor asked PNP chief Director General Nicanor Bartolome and NBI Director Nonatus Rojas to revoke the gun licenses of Murillo, who reportedly used Velasco’s name in his alleged illegal activities such as gunrunning and illegal disposal of waste products at Cavite.

Velasco added that Murillo had sent him text messages, threatening him and daring him to have his house raided. Several witnesses confirmed that the cell phone number listed in the messages is Murillo’s regular business phone.

Velasco said he also received a message from another number, stating “Isasama kita sa hukay ni Col. Vina pati anak mong si Karl (I will have you join Col. Vina in his grave, and your son Karl).”

Col. Teofilo Vina – an officer of the defunct Presidenital Anti-Organized Task Force who was implicated in the November 2000 killings of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito – was ambushed in January 2003 in Tanza, Cavite while attending a gathering with Velasco and several others.

Rojas confirmed that “Murillo is neither a regular or confidential agent of the bureau.”

Petrasanta, in his resolution, justified the cancellation of Murillo’s gun licenses when the businessman reportedly threatened to kill Velasco and his family after the prosecutor “exposed his illegal activities.”

Murillo also allegedly threatened to kill Ma. Cecilia Fernandez and her husband after she filed syndicated estafa and falsification of documents charges against him with the Cavite prosecutor’s office last year. Fernandez accused Murillo of failing to deliver several rolls of fabric after she paid P800,000 in advance, Petrasanta said.