Man nabbed for slay of motel customer

CEBU - One of two men suspected of killing the son of a retired Air Force official was arrested yesterday afternoon in sitio Puntod, Mambaling, Cebu City.

SPO4 Ferdinand Tumakay and SPO1 Arnulfo Quiachon of the Mandaue City Police Office, together with personnel of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group-7, arrested Roldan Logronio Tamarra, 25, of sitio Puntod. 

Tamarra was allegedly one of the two men who stabbed dead Carl Steven Reyes, 29, inside Moonlight Inn Motel at the North Reclamation Area on June 29, 2007.

Tamarra was positively identified by Ritchie Villanueva, a former room boy of the motel, as one of the two companions of Reyes inside one of the motel rooms that night. 

Villanueva said that he recognized the suspect because he and the other man left Room A-17 even after they had just checked in. The two said they will just buy cigarettes outside and will be back immediately.

Villanueva said he was about to stop them from leaving when Tamara pulled out a knife from his waist. Villanueva then called his fellow room boys to check Room A-17 where they found Reyes bathed in his own blood after he had been stabbed several times.   

Villanueva later identified Tamarra from several photos shown to him by the police. 

Tumakay said Tamarra was a "volunteer witness" who gave them names of the suspects behind the killing. However, after giving information on alleged suspects, Tamarra went into hiding.

One of those alleged suspects later told Tumakay that he heard the suspect talking with another neighbor that he killed somebody in Moonlight Inn.

Tumakay said that they conducted surveillance on the suspect for two weeks after an informant told him he lived in Mambaling after more than a year of hiding. 

Before Reyes checked into the motel, he had a meeting with his co-workers at Lexmark that ended late at night. 

Although they all left together in one vehicle, his co-workers said he got off at the foot of the Mactan-Mandaue Bridge and rode a taxi. It was later learned that he checked into the Moonlight Inn Motel with two companions. 

The family of the victim had offered P100,000 for the arrest of the suspects. – Flor Z. Perolina/BRP (THE FREEMAN)