Relatives cry foul vs police claim that slain guard a robbery 'insider'

Relatives of security guard Edgardo Emboledo Sr. who was gunned down in the robbery of Dranix Distributors Inc. in barangay Basak San Nicolas last Monday, protested over a police official's statement earlier that pointed at him as the robbery "insider."

The guard's sister Stephanie Quiling, in an interview over TV Patrol Central Visayas, said the statement of City Police theft and robbery section chief Alexis Relado was not fair, and that it insulted more their family.

Quiling dared Relado to prove that Emboledo was the robbers' "insider" that allowed them to run off with P1 million loot.

Relado reportedly said that Emboledo was killed in order not to reveal the people behind the robbery of the establishment that he was guarding.

The guard's mother-in-law Roberta Abalo added that she did not believe Relado's statement and said: "Maayo motrabaho ug buotan nga pagka-amahan sa iyang upat ka anak si Edgardo."

Abalo further expressed her dismay to TV Patrol: "Siya (Emboledo) pa ang gipatay, siya na hinoon ang insider, dili sab na makiangayon ilabi na sa namatay."

The remains of Emboledo had been taken since to his house at the mountain barangay of Tanyanias in San Fernando.

Cebu City Police acting director Patrociño Comendador, for his part, clarified yesterday that Emboledo's possible involvement in the robbery was a mere opinion of Relado.

Comendador said he does not want to dishonor the already dead Embolode who could not defend himself anymore, but then investigations so far showed that the slain guard was about 80 percent involved in the robbery.

The police however are working more to validate this, and that there is a need to gather more evidences which will support the theory that links Embolode to the robbers.

Assuming that Embolode was truly the "insider", Comendador said it would not stop there because the police would still work to get the robbers and the mastermind.

Comendador said some of the suspected robbers were already identified but their identities could not be divulged to the public yet. He added that investigation has been conducted also on the firm's employees, based on raw information that some of them were disgruntled of the company before.

The other security guard Edgardo Tabigue, who survived from the robbers' attack, is not off the hook yet even if he passed the lie detector test conducted by the National Bureau of Investigation, said Comendador.

He said that Tabigue would still be the subject of further investigation until the police will come up with conclusive findings on the matter.

Comendador also said they are now looking into the possibility that the Luzon-based "Acetylene Gang" might be involved in the Dranix robbery, citing a similar method that this group had used in robbing a pawnshop in Vigan City in January last year.

In the P13 million Vigan pawnshop robbery, the robbers were also in police uniforms and approached the guards that they were inspecting the establishment. They then handcuffed the guards and taped the latter's mouths and feet. Not one of the guards was killed however.

Comendador said this gang has been operating in various parts of the country, and there were reports that its members originally came from Kalinga-Apayao, then merged with others from Bacolod City and Iloilo City.

The original group of six members first struck in Bataan then four of them died when they operated in Baguio City. The remaining two of them have since then formed a new group. - Flor Z. Perolina and Ramil V. Ayuman