Police tracking down suspects in Taptap killing

CEBU, Philippines - The police are now hunting down at least three suspects behind the hacking to death of two men whose bodies were found in the mountain barangay of Taptap last Maundy Thursday.

Chief Insp. George Ylanan, head of the City Investigation and Detective Management Branch, said they recovered yesterday pieces of evidence that may give them a “very good reason to believe” that the subjects of their hot pursuit operation are the real culprits.

“(Evidence) strengthens our case against these persons. We’re not divulging their names yet but naa na ta’y name and we have a very strong case,” Ylanan told reporters yesterday.

Ylanan said one of the suspects owns a fighting cock farm in the mountain barangay of Malubog, near Taptap, and the other one, a cohort during illegal drug session. The third one served as the spotter.

The police official said these people are behind the death of Glenn Parawan, 32, and his 17-year-old cousin, Manuel Edgardo Parawan III, who were found hacked, their face and neck tied with a packaging tape, and their bodies placed inside two sacks.

Ylanan said they found in the farm sacks for chicken feeds that match with the sacks where the victims were stuffed.

In the same area, Ylanan said, they also found a yellow packaging which also matched the tape used on the victims.

Yesterday, the police picked up the farm’s caretaker for interrogation. The suspects were not around.

Ylanan said the “spotter” joined in a hot pursuit operation against the victims’ cousin, Cloyd Arias, 31, in Barangay Sambag 2, that morning for shooting to death Waldemar Pacis, 36, over illegal drugs. Pacis, is the main suspect’s body guard, Ylanan said.

The victims, who are residents of Danao City, came here to supposedly visit Arias, but the group of Pacis, in revenge for Arias, killed the two.

The spotter, who abducted the victims at Fuente Osmeña, was believed to have absorbed information about the victims at the Fuente Police Station where the victims went, thinking Arias was detained there.

The IDMB, Crime Scene Investigation Unit, and Homicide Section are helping one another for the suspects’ arrest. – (FREEMAN)