Businessman takes family hostage in school

MANILA, Philippines - A Chinese businessman, clad in a bulletproof vest and armed with two .45 caliber pistols, took hostage his mother, two nephews, a niece and two housemaids in his parents’ school in Pasig City yesterday afternoon.

Emerson Go, 31, released his mother, Mildred, 66; and one of the maids, identified only as Ceding, at past 6 p.m., police said.

Go freed the other hostages and surrendered at around 7:30 p.m., according to National Capital Region Police Office chief Director Leonardo Espina.

Prior to the surrender, the police crisis management team, headed by Eastern Police District (EPD) director Chief Superintendent Mike Laurel, said it had been negotiating with Go to release the other hostages – his nephews, eight-year-old Matthew and Casey, 5; niece, Maxine, 4; and housemaid Bollet Buenavente.

Laurel said Go’s initial demand was for his wife and three children be brought to him to their residence at the third floor of the St. Gabriel International School, located in Barangay Palatiw.

Senior Superintendent Mario Rariza, Pasig City police chief, said he talked with Go’s father-in-law, who said his daughter refused her estranged husband’s demand “out of fear for their lives.”

“We are now exerting utmost effort to convince him to release his hostages,” said Rariza, adding that a barangay watchman was talking to Go “to while away the hours.”

According to Laurel, Go and his wife had a bitter quarrel Thursday. The incident prompted his wife to leave their residence and move in with her parents in New Manila, Quezon City with their three children.

Police said Go had been treated in a drug rehabilitation center in the past. He had just come from a vacation in China, investigators said.

Laurel said Go was looking for his wife and three children and took four members of his family and two housemaids hostage just before 3 p.m. when he could not find them.

Just before 6 p.m., Go barricaded himself and his hostages at the second floor of the school, which is owned by his parents, Laurel said.

Laurel designated Rariza as the ground commander of the city’s Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team and the District Special Reaction Unit (DSRU) deployed in the area and Senior Superintendent Danilo Maligalig, chief of the EPD’s directorial staff, as the ground supervisor.