3 North Cotabato cops brought to Crame to expose ‘rubout’

COTABATO CITY - Three policemen, who claimed to have witnessed the alleged Feb. 17 rubout by their fellow lawmen, supposedly led by North Cotabato police director Chief Superintendent Odelon Ramo—neda, of three suspected Pentagon gang members left for Manila yesterday to give details about the incident.

Presidential Assistant for Mindanao Jesus Dureza fetched the three policemen — SPO3 Ricardo Pacete, SPO1 Ricardo Romero and PO1 Christopher Coronado — from the archbishop’s residence in Kidapawan City where they had sought sanctuary.

Accompanying Dureza was police Director Lucas Managuelod whom North Cotabato church leaders had requested to accompany the three policemen to Camp Crame where they would give details about the alleged rubout.

Sources said the three policemen sought refuge at the archbishop’s residence after the alleged "salvaging" (summary execution) because they feared for their lives.

They claimed to have been instructed to keep mum about the incident.

The three policemen were reportedly at their outpost in West Patadon, Matalam town when Ramoneda’s group arrived with the three suspected Pentagon gang members, all of them handcuffed.

The victims, all Muslims, were then gunned down one after the other just meters away from the detachment along the Cotabato-Davao Highway.

The three policemen told Church leaders that firearms were then placed near the victims’ bodies, apparently to make it appear they were killed in a shootout.

Ramoneda denied the allegations, saying his conscience "is clear" and that he is willing to be investigated. He described the three policemen as "scalawags" in the police service.

The policemen first sought help from the parish priest of Matalam, a predominantly Ilonggo town, days after the alleged rubout.

The priest then brought them to the archbishop’s residence in Kidapawan. — With Edith Regalado