SSS lawyer shot dead

CAMP VICENTE LIM, Laguna, Philippines — A legal adviser of the Social Security System in San Pablo, Laguna was gunned down in Tiaong, Quezon on Sunday night.

Expectacion Baldeo, 64, suffered multiple gunshot wounds.

Baldeo was talking to the supervisor of a gasoline station at her office in Barangay Lalig at around 6:20 p.m. when an unidentified gunman entered.

Initial investigation showed the assailant talked to Baldeo for a few minutes before shooting her. The gasoline station supervisor was unhurt.

Superintendent Freddie Dantes, Tiaong police chief, said it is possible that Baldeo knew her  attacker because she allowed him to enter her office.

Probers said the killing could be work-related or due to a personal grudge.

“We are reviewing footages of closed-circuit television cameras near the crime scene,” Dantes told The STAR.

NBI probes university head’s slay

Meanwhile, Sally Barbaso, National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) director in Northern Mindanao, confirmed that Justice Secretary  Vitaliano Aguirre II ordered them to investigate the killing of Ricardo Rotoras, University of Science and Technology of Southern Philippines (USTSP) president.

Barbaso said he received Aguirre’s order yesterday, adding that the NBI main office did not set a deadline for them to finish the probe.

In Department Order 764, Aguirre said the NBI should conduct an investigation and case buildup and file charges “if evidence so warrants.”

Aguirre also ordered NBI Director Dante Gierran to give updates on the progress of the investigation.

Rotoras was gunned down by unidentified men outside his house at Golden Glow North subdivision in Barangay Carmen, Cagayan de Oro on Saturday.

Rotoras, who served as head of the USTSP since 2006, was also the president of the Philippine Association of State Universities and Colleges. 

The Cagayan de Oro city government offered a reward of P1 million for information leading to the arrest of the assailants. – Ed Amoroso, Gerry Lee Gorit