The court yesterday directed the Cebu City prosecutors’ office to conduct a preliminary investigation on the homicide and frustrated homicide charges filed against a police officer accused of killing a civilian and wounding another during a shootout with a fellow enforcer.
Regional Trial Court judge Macaundas M. Hadjirasul granted the motion of P01 Luther Lapinig to avail of a preliminary investigation on his case so that the Cebu City Prosecutors’ Office could evaluate whether there is probable cause for him to be indicted.
Lapinig, through his lawyer Edwin Yu, convinced the court to grant his request because the information of his case – that carries the penalty of at least six to 12 years imprisonment — was immediately filed in court without conducting the required preliminary investigation.
Yu cited section 7 of Rule 112 of the Rules on Criminal Procedures which provides that a preliminary investigation is required to be conducted before the filing of a complaint or information in court for offenses where a penalty prescribed by law is at least four years, two months and one day.
“There is actually no sufficient ground to endanger a well founded belief that the accused in this case should be held for trial of the crime,” Lapinig’s counsel claimed. The court directed the Cebu City Prosecutors’ Office to render its report the soonest possible time.
Lapinig was accused of killing Rowel Abarri, 27, and causing injuries to Dario Encarnacion, 43, during a shootout with SP01 Inocencio Lumayag on Garfield St. in barangay Pahina San Nicolas last November 12.
Lumayag was responding to an armed person alarm, but found out that the subject of the complaint was Lapinig, a policeman assigned with the Regional Intelligence Office who was wearing civilian clothes at that time.
Lumayag, who is a member of the miscellaneous team of the Carbon Police Station, lives in Garfield Street. Both policemen, who were in civilian clothes, did not recognize each other and ended up shooting at each other. The incident happened during the victory party for newly-elected Pahina San Nicolas barangay captain Antonio Carusca. — Rene U. Borromeo/QSB