Drug junkie hides victims’ bodies in cabinet

ORION, Bataan — A junkshop helper, believed to be a drug addict, killed a pregnant 17-year-old girl and a Grade 6 pupil and stuffed their bodies inside a cabinet in his rented room in an upland village here last Saturday, police said.

The foul smell led neighbors of the suspect, Ronald Santos, in Barangay Upper Bilolo to the bodies of Sally Tauro, who was four months’ pregnant, and her cousin, 12-year-old Jerome Balila, placed in black plastic bags and kept inside the cabinet.

Santos, now detained at the Bataan provincial jail, reportedly owned up to the crime in the presence of a lawyer hired by the victims’ relatives.

Police said Tauro and Balila had been dead for about 16 hours before their bodies were found.

The boy was drowned in a steel barrel of water in the comfort room, while Tauro was suffocated using a bath towel, police said.

According to the probers, Tauro had resisted the sexual advances of Santos. Her body was scheduled for autopsy at the police crime laboratory in Balanga City to determine if she was molested.

The victims stayed in the junkshop because the boy’s mother, Mary, worked as a stay-in househelp of the owner, Dante Perrera.