Cops nab 1 in Kabacan vice-mayor murder

COTABATO CITY, Philippines  – The police filed criminal charges Thursday against two men tagged as killers of Vice-Mayor Policronio Dulay of Kabacan town in North Cotabato.

Dulay, who was seeking re-election as candidate of the Liberal Party, was emerging from a department store at the town proper of Kabacan when one of two men riding a motorcycle together shot him repeatedly with a .45 caliber pistol as they got close, killing him on the spot.

The triggerman, Jomar Utala, 26, who is also a suspected drug trafficker, was arrested last week by policemen in a dragnet in a residential area in Kabacan. He readily confessed to his having killed Dulay for “a fee,” along with his accomplice, 29-year-old Batong Magalib.
                                                                            
Senior Inspector Rodel Calo, provincial chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in North Cotabato, said they have filed murder charges against Utala and Magalib.

Calo said witnesses have identified Utala and Mugalib as the killers of Dulay. 

Calo said Mugalib, who immediately left Kabacan after the murder of Dulay, is still at large.

The municipal council of Kabacan initially offered a P200, 000 in exchange for information that would lead to the arrest of Dulay’s killers. The reward was raised to P600,000 with contributions from Kabacan Mayor George Tan and North Cotabato Gov. Emmylou Mendoza.