Dalaguete road deaths update: Truck driver to be indicted; Capitol to help victims' kin

The Dalaguete Police is slated to file today charges against the truck driver who figured in a road collision with a motorcycle, the riders of which died on the spot along barangay Mantalongon, Dalaguete last Wednesday morning.

This developed as Marivic Garces, chief of the Provincial Social Welfare and Development Office, yesterday disclosed that the Capitol is willing to extend P5,000 in financial assistance to each of the families of the three fatalities.

Town policeman, PO1 Richard Talingting, yesterday told The Freeman that traffic accident through reckless imprudence resulting in triple homicide and damage to property would be the charges against Joselito Elimino, the driver and owner of the truck.

Talingting clarified that Elimino was not detained at the police station but was only put in custody of retired judge Epifanio Llanos, to whom the driver turned himself in after the accident.

Siblings Roberto, 26, and Evelyn Medina, 23, and Thelma Evarda, 22, died on the spot just meters away from the Mantalongon cemetery when the motorcycle they were riding collided head on with Elimino's cargo truck.

Relatives of the victims went to the police station yesterday morning informing the police that, after the autopsies are done, they would be taking the bodies out of the St. Williams Funeral Homes in barangay Guiwanon, of the town, so they could bring them to their residences.

Reports have it that the Medina siblings and Evarda earlier borrowed the motorcycle from a friend supposedly to use this in going to the cemetery that morning.

The motorcycle they were riding however crashed into the approaching cargo truck, driven by Elimino of Dalaguete town. The impact was so strong that sent the motorcycle under the truck and the three motorcycle riders died on the spot with severe head injuries.

Talingting earlier said that the two vehicles came from opposite directions of the highway. Elimino however insisted to the police that it was the motorcycle that came crashing into his truck, a matter that some witnesses also affirmed.

The truck was laden at the time with sacks of rice, rooster feeds and some grocery items, which Elimino, as his usual trade, were about to deliver to stores at various barangays in Dalaguete.

The Capitol official said that extending financial help is Capitol's standard procedure every time a financially hard-up constituent dies and whose family seeks financial assistance.

The Dalaguete social welfare officer should submit to Garces' office the case study and death certificates of the three fatalities so that the Capitol office would issue the voucher for the release of the money.

Garces further said that should the victims' families also request for assistance, such as sardines, rice and noodles, for the duration of the wake, the Capitol would be willing to grant such request. -Norvie S. Misa and Cristina C. Birondo/RAE