NBI confiscates Marantan's firearm

MANILA, Philippines - The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) on Friday confiscated the firearm of police intelligence officer Superintendent Hansel Marantan, who is involved in the killing of 13 people in Atimonan, Quezon last January 6.

 

A dzMM radio report quoting NBI's Special Investigator 3 Frederico Criste said that agents went to St. Luke's Medical Center-Global City in Taguig and took Marantan's firearm.

 

"Iyong baril nasa amin na. Isinurender na nila for examination," the radio report quoted Criste as saying.

 

Criste, meanwhile, said that Marantan refused to personally provide the NBI investigating team his statement on the Atimonan incident.

 

He said that Marantan has been advised by his lawyer to just submit a written affidavit on the incident.

 

The NBI investigator also said that their medico legal team has already examined Marantan's wound that he allegedly sustained during the Atimonan incident.

 

Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said Thursday that "definitely no shootout" happened in Atimonan, contradicting Marantan's claim on his gunshot wound in the arm.

 

The Philippine National Police's fact-finding body had said that Siman's group did not fire their firearms during the supposed shootout. It had also indicated some of the firearms found by Marantan's team at the site could have been planted.

 

The NBI earlier said that Marantan's firearm was not among those submitted by the local police as part of the evidence of the supposed shootout.

 

Marantan was the only one wounded among the government forces involved in the alleged shootout with the group police claimed were members of a gun-for-hire syndicate.

 

The alleged shootout led to the killing of 13 people, including a high-ranking police official.