Kuratong case prosecutors challenge Aglipay to tell all

The prosecution panel in the 1995 Kuratong Baleleng case challenged PNP Deputy Director for Administration General Edgar Aglipay yesterday to tell the public what really transpired on May 18, 1995 when 11 members of the robbery gang were allegedly summarily executed.

The panel said the PNP Special Action Force (PNP-SAF), of which Aglipay was then head, failed to submit a report on the police operation.

At a press conference, Justice Undersecretary Jose Calida and lawyer Arno Sanidad, members of the prosecution, posed the challenge to Aglipay and three other police officials under him — Col. Benjamin Magalong, Col. Samson Tucay and Maj. Dionedo Carlos to shed light on the case.

Magalong is now assigned at the office of Deputy Director General Virtus Gil, PNP deputy chief for operations. Tucay is with Aglipay in the anti-illegal drugs task force, while Carlos is with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency.

The 11 members of the Kuratong Baleleng were arrested in Superville Subdivision in Parañaque and were later killed in an alleged shootout with lawmen the following day along Commonwealth Avenue in Quezon City.

"Aglipay was the head of the SAF at that time. He knew what really happened. We don‘t need to talk to them, they’re law enforcement agents and they should be the ones to come out and speak the truth. That’s why we are challenging them today to come out and speak the truth," Sanidad added.

Aglipay told The STAR, however, that he cannot be held for command responsibility because he attended a wedding in Manila on the eve of the alleged shootout in Quezon City.

He added that his unit was merely deployed as support group to the operation led by Task Force Habagat under then Lt. Col. Panfilo Lacson, now a senator.

"I am merely doing my job for our countrymen," Aglipay said, without commenting further on queries whether the resurrection of the issue has something to do with him being one of the top contenders for the next PNP chief.

However, Calida said the prosecution will ask PNP chief Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. to request Aglipay to present his side on the case.

"The biggest question General Aglipay has to answer is why there was no operation report on the operation conducted on the evening of May 17, 1995. There‘s nothing in the records," Calida said.

The prosecution explained that charges of obstruction of justice or falsification might be filed against some of the police officers who participated in the whitewash.

"The alternative is we might file charges against some of them who are part of the whitewash. These were his (Aglipay) men. If Aglipay talks to these men and tell them the truth, I suppose these men have to abide by that order," Sanidad said.

Meanwhile, Senior Inspector Ysmael Yu said the decision of Quezon City Regional Trial Court Judge Ma. Theresa Yadao of Branch 81 to dismiss the Kuratong Baleleng case was a great shock to him and many witnesses.

"She totally disregarded what I, and several other witnesses, had to say about the events that led to the rubout along Commonwealth Avenue," he said.

Yu presented the affidavits of four new witnesses to support his testimony and the testimonies of Mario Enad, Wilmor Medes and Abelardo Ramos.

The four new witnesses are Police Senior Inspector Marlon Sapla, PO2 Gerald Antolin, PO3 Leonilo Lanceta and SPO1 Loreto Valle.

Sapla was the Operations Officer of the Special Operations Battalion of the PNP, who described how he formed two teams for the planned raid in Superville.

Antolin and Lanceta were both part of the assault team led by Yu. Valle was a member of the team assigned to secure the front and sides of the house during the raid.

Yu said the affidavits of the new witnesses, who were all members of the arresting team, prove that the alleged Kuratong Baleleng gang members were alive, unarmed and in the custody of Lacson, and Superintendents Jewel Canson, Romeo Acop, Francisco Zubia and other PNP officers.

"It’s clear to myself, and the other witnesses, that what occurred in Commonwealth Avenue was not a shootout but a rubout," Yu said.

The prosecution said Judge Yadao has no choice but to reconsider her earlier decision dismissing the multiple murder case against Lacson and 33 police officers and find probable cause to issue warrants of arrest against the accused.