Wanted for 37 years for multiple murder in Luzon nabbed in BARMM

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Policemen arrested on Wednesday, September 2, in Upi, Maguindanao del Norte in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao a man wanted for multiple murder in 1989 in Ilagan, Isabela in Region 2 in  Luzon.

The suspect, whom officials of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group and the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region identified only as “Mando,” yielded peacefully when CIDG agents, backed by personnel of the Upi Municipal Police Station and operatives from different units of PRO-BAR, cornered and cuffed him at one spot in Barangay Nuro in Upi in an operation assisted by local executives.

The Department of the Interior and Local Government had reportedly allocated a P50,000 reward for his arrest.

Friends of the now detained suspect in Upi, an upland town Maguindanao del Norte, about 40 kilometers southwest of Cotabato City, the regional capital of BARMM, had told reporters that he was in the municipality for more than two decades and that they learned of his being wanted for a high-profile criminal case in Ilagan in Isabela province in Region 2 only after he was arrested in their town center last Wednesday, based on a warrant from a court in Isabela province.

Officials of the CIDG in their national headquarters and in the Bangsamoro region and counterparts in PRO-BAR in Camp SK Pendatun in Parang, Maguindanao del Norte, reportedly learned of his presence in Upi from informants, enabling them to carry out the operation that resulted in his arrest.

The suspect shall be escorted by policemen back to Luzon for him to be prosecuted in court in connection with his having allegedly killed four individuals in a gun attack in Barangay Bagutari in Sto. Tomas in Ilagan, Isabela on Aug. 24, 1989.