Police claim TNT found in car of slain Navy officer

Police found enough explosives to destroy a single-story building inside the abandoned car of Navy Lt. (sg) Ricardo Catchillar, a bomb expert said yesterday.

Chief Inspector Gerard Sison, head of the Aviation Security Group (ASG)’s special operation unit, said the four pounds of trinitrotoluene (TNT) found inside Catchillar’s Mitsubishi car was rigged to explode once its time fuse was ignited.

Catchillar was slain with former Air Transportation Office (ATO) chief Col. Panfilo Villaruel after they seized control of the Manila control tower at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Centennial Terminal II in Parañaque City Saturday.

Sison said his office received a call at 6:40 p.m. Saturday from a certain Mr. Reyes informing them of Catchillar’s car, which was found abandoned at the Caltex gasoline station in Merville subdivision in Parañaque City.

An ocular inspection of the car showed it was loaded with explosives, which were found on the front passenger seat. Two three-inch time fuses with black powder were attached to two improvised bombs.

Southern Police District director Chief Superintendent Jose Gutierrez said investigators were still trying to determine if Catchillar and Villaruel had any other companions tasked with lighting the bombs’ fuses.

"They were already complete. The bombs were rigged to explode. All they had to do was light the fuse," Sison said.

"We want to find out the truth, whether there are other groups," Gutierrez said, "although there are no indicators as of now that there are other companions."

Sison said Catchillar left his car keys with the gasoline station’s security guard. The bomb would have wrought great destruction had it been detonated while parked at the gasoline station, he added.

He said his team’s main concern was defusing the bombs before they blew. "The first thing we did was to render the car safe," Sison said," that it would not explode... we were at a gasoline station and any explosion would trigger a huge fire." — With Marichu Villanueva