‘They failed to kill me so they killed John instead’

They couldn’t carry out "Plan A," which was to kill the woman, so the assassins resorted to "Plan B," which was to silence her former lover.

Mary "Rosebud" Ong said yesterday the people she had accused of being involved in the illegal drug trade were the ones who ordered police Superintendent John Campos killed.

She said the killing of Campos was actually Plan B of these men. "Plan A was to kill me. They failed so they killed John instead," she said.

Ong said an unidentified assassin tried to kill her last Oct. 21 inside the military safehouse where she and her family are staying. "I was just lucky to have escaped alive," she said.

Ong also revealed that she has been convincing Campos for the past weeks to testify against Sen. Panfilo Lacson, former police chief whom she has accused of summarily executing drug lords and now, of masterminding the killing of Campos.

In tears, Ong went to the Philippine National Police (PNP) Crime Laboratory at Camp Crame before noon yesterday to catch a last glimpse of Campos, 36, whose remains will be brought to the St. Ignatius Chapel inside the camp.

"Oh my God, I wanted to see him for the last time," Ong told The STAR when informed that Campos’ body had just been moved out of the PNP Crime Laboratory morgue and was on its way to a funeral parlor in Quezon City a few seconds after she arrived.

The two lived together like husband and wife from 1996 to 2000. In their last years of their relationship, Ong said, began the crimes which she is now accusing Lacson of masterminding.

It was also during those years that Campos allegedly turned from good cop to bad cop.

Ong, clad in traditional Cheomsang, said she still loves the man whom her two kids from an earlier marriage looked up to as their father.

"I am a woman. He was always a special part of my life... I have always cared for him and I have never been given up my hopes on him," Ong said.

"If John came out, he would have been able to pin down Ping (Lacson)," she said.

Prior to the killing of Campos, she related the incident in the safehouse where an armed man in military uniform was apprehended before he could find her.

Ong said she was able to talk with one of Campos’ classmates at the Philippine Military Academy Class 1987 some two weeks ago.

Campos had asked assurance that he and his family will be secured once he decides to come out against Lacson.

"Two weeks ago I was still convincing him to come out because I said ‘we can’t allow Ping Lacson to be president, we can’t allow the country to be ruled by a drug lord, we can’t allow the country to be ruled by a demon’," she said.

In a Senate hearing last year, Ong, a former secret agent of the government working on illegal drugs cases, had accused Lacson of involvement in the summary execution of suspected drug lords.

Her accusation turned into a soap opera of sorts as it also touched on her movie-like life as an agent, including her five-year love affair with Campos, her former mentor.

At the height of the Senate investigation that ensued, Ong and Campos were even seen hurling personal accusations on national television. At one point, Campos was even heard cursing Ong.

Throughout all these, however, Ong said she never gave up in praying for Campos.

"He was a good man. Nahawa lang siya sa mga kasama (He just fell into the wrong company). I never lost hope that he would someday turn around, stand by me and become a hero," she said.

Ong first met Campos in 1993 when the then 27-year-old policeman was assigned as a liaison officer of the PNP Narcotics Group at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

Ong was then being employed by the PNP as a double agent, and her role was to pinpoint to Campos any suspected drug lord arriving through the airport.

Through their close association, Ong and Campos fell in love. In one assignment, it was even Campos who gave Ong the codename "Rosebud," and the name stuck.

Campos succumbed to three bullet wounds including a fatal one in the head and two in the back after a lone motorcycle-riding assassin peppered him with bullets at the 24-hour Tita Ghem’s Food Haus in in Barangay Don Bosco in Parañaque City.

A companion, Antonio Cabanban, was unhurt, but a helper in the snack house, Emily Dumlao, was hit by stray bullets and died later in hospital.

Ong noted that there was so much fear in Campos as he mulled the possibility of testifying against Lacson.

"I am very, very sure ... It has been Lacson’s style," she said, baring that the senator had launched "Operation Plan: Pearl of the Orient" to liquidate her.