No evidence against two blast suspects

Investigators looking into last week’s bomb blast outside a grocery store in Antipolo City have shifted their probe to the brewing problem between the store’s management and stallholders.

This, as the Rizal police admitted that they failed to gather evidence linking two arrested Indian nationals, Pankaj Komar and Penkej Jain, to the blast outside Rempson Supermarket that injured two firemen and destroyed about P1 million worth of property, including a number of stalls near the store.

A background investigation into the suspects showed that they were involved in the "5-6" lending business during their stay in the country.

Komar has been in the country for more than two years, while Jain arrived six months ago, said Superintendent Normandy Carpio, provincial officer of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG).

Carpio, however, said his office would push through with the forgery case they filed against Komar and Jain with the Antipolo City prosecutor’s office.

A third suspect, Filipino Eduardo Espejon, 27, of Bicutan, Taguig, was charged in the same case. He was released Friday after posting a P30,000 bail.

The Rizal CIDG confiscated a number of plates used in the manufacture of fake P100, P500 and P1,000 bills inside the room of Komar and Jain at the Gem’s Hotel and Resort where they checked in a day before the blast. The two foreigners denied ownership of the seized items.