Quezon City van shooting: Search on for pistol’s owner

MANILA, Philippines - The Quezon City Police District (QCPD) is looking for the registered owner of a .40 caliber Glock pistol used by a Philippine Constabulary general’s son to kill two persons in a van in Barangay White Plains, an official said yesterday.

Joseph See will be invited to appear before the police “to shed light” on the ongoing investigation of Jose Maria Abaya’s case, Chief Inspector Rodel Marcelo, chief of the QCPD’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit said.

“We will ask him (See) why his gun ended up in Abaya’s possession,” Marcelo said, but clarified that See will not be interrogated as he might have sold the gun to Abaya.

Abaya, a son of the late general Antonio Abaya and a nephew of former Armed Forces chief Narciso Abaya, turned himself in and confessed to shooting at a UV Express van on Sept. 1.

Marcelo said he sent three teams to trace See’s whereabouts after he was not found at his house in Malate.

See’s neighbors said he moved a few years ago. 

According to records from the PNP’s Firearms and Explosives Office (FEO), See is the registered owner of the .40 caliber Glock pistol used by Abaya in the White Plains shooting.

Marcelo said See has no reason to hide from the authorities since there was no case filed against him.

The FEO reported that two guns were registered to Abaya – a .45 caliber Glock pistol and a .357 pistol.

The .357 pistol was the firearm Abaya used to shoot two security guards who were supposed to return him to a drug rehabilitation facility in Parañaque City in 2012. He killed one guard, Roger Biquit, and wounded the other.

The homicide case filed against Abaya in 2012 was dismissed after Biquit’s widow, Marites, filed an affidavit of desistance. 

The caliber .45 Glock pistol, however, is no longer in Abaya’s possession.

Meanwhile, the QCPD has amended the charges filed against Abaya with city prosecutor Reynaldo Garcia after they obtained the death certificate of van driver Ronebert Ycot.

Ycot died in a hospital Thursday morning while his passenger, assistant bank manager Joyce Santos, 41, died a few hours after she was hospitalized Tuesday night.

Another passenger, Duke Angelo David, has been discharged from the hospital. He sustained a gunshot wound in the back.

Abaya is now facing two counts of murder, two counts of attempted murder, frustrated murder, and illegal possession of firearm.

Tagged in TPLEx strafing

Meanwhile, Abaya has been linked to an incident along the Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway (TPLEx) in June, according to an ABS-CBN report.

Gerardo Dionisio said Abaya shot at their patrol car along the expressway on June 6. No one was hurt in the incident.

Dionisio said his firm, RCJ Security and Investigation Inc., is tasked with maintaining security along the expressway and that they were attacked by Abaya with no warning and provocation.

Abaya’s Toyota FJ was immediately impounded while Dionisio’s camp charged him with malicious mischief.