Ex-convict runs amuck in school, kills 3, hurts 6

TALISAYAN, Zamboanga City, Philippines – A semestral break ended in horror yesterday when a former rape convict went on a stabbing spree in a public elementary school here, killing a student, teacher and a guardian, and wounding six others before he was himself killed, authorities said.

Senior Superintendent Edwin de Ocampo, city police chief, identified the fatalities in the incident at the Talisayan Elementary School in this coastal village, 26 kilometers west of the city proper, as Cess Dorine Orpiano, 12, a Grade 6 student; Lorna Pulalon, a Grade 2 teacher; guardian Ruben Flores, 64; and the suspect, Fely Mateo.

Those wounded were Grade 5 teachers Ludivina Balilo and Joni Torres; and Grade 6 pupils Joshua Demco, 11; Maria Lyka Basing, 12; Princess Briones, 12; and Michaela Jacona, 12. – With Rainier Allan Ronda