PNP official tagged as rob gang head

MANILA, Philippines - A police official is being investigated after he was identified as the alleged leader of a robbery gang that has had numerous hits in different establishments in Metro Manila and in the provinces.

A report obtained by The STAR named the police official, with investigators recommending that a deeper probe be conducted to determine his actual involvement in the gang.

The report stated that investigators deemed as “reliable” the information that they had gathered so far, noting that the data that came from different persons – including arrested suspects – matched each other and the actual circumstances of the robberies.

The police official’s name surfaced when his uniform was found at the house of a robbery suspect who was arrested following a violent heist earlier this year. The suspect told investigators that the police official used to be his boss as he was once the latter’s assistant on his property.

In September, an informant provided a breakthrough in the investigation. The informant is a brother of one of the gang’s members, who is in hiding after two other gang members were assassinated.

The informant said he went to the investigators after their mother prodded him to protect his brother, who is the subject of an arrest warrant in connection with one of the robberies, from the police official’s “rage.”

Other cops involved

Based on the report, other bits of information point to the complicity of policemen in the gang’s robbery operations.

Following one of the mall robberies, a police colonel received information that another policeman was among those responsible for the heist. The report stated that based on the information revealed by the informant, “a number of police officers are in connivance with the group’s illegal activities.” The informant also named another police officer. 

The report also stated that before each robbery, members of the gang would engage in a “pot session.”

Police officers who gathered these pieces of information recommended that a “deeper investigation and validation” be conducted to determine their veracity. They also recommended that the gang member, whose brother became an informant, be put into custody so he could provide more information on the robbery group.