Puerto mayor hits NBI `plot' vs cop chief

Puerto Princesa Mayor Edward Hagedorn accused the National Bureau of Investigation in Palawan yesterday of using a person facing three rape cases in court for orchestrating the ouster of his chief of police.

In a press conference at the National Press Club yesterday, Hagedorn condemned the alleged abuses and violations committed by Artemio Sacaguing, chief of the NBI's Palawan office, "on the use of Francis Marlon Marquez as an asset in spite of his string of criminal cases."

Marquez, was arrested last Jan. 14 by elements of the PNP and Bantay Puerto for allegedly making an illegal arrest using a toy gun and an NBI-owned Motorola hand held radio.

Marquez, Hagedorn said is a "celebrity convict" among whose victims is Col. Feliciano Dimayuga, Puerto Princesa chief of police.

Hagedorn said Marquez admitted before police investigators that he was released from jail on orders of Sacaguing to serve as a witness against Dimayuga.

In a sworn statement made before Palawan media and his legal counsel, lawyer Zoilo Cruzat, president of the local IBP, Marquez said that the NBI wanted him to lie in a press conference on the slaying of drug lord Nestor Chua.

He said Director Sacaguing ordered him to tell the media that "Dimayuga killed Chua."

Marquez said he refused Sacaguing's order because at the time of Chua's death, he was detained at the city jail.