(UPDATE) Cops found guilty for protecting shabu laboratory in La Union

MANILA, Philippines (Xinhua) - A lower court recently found guilty two policemen, one of them a bemedalled deputy provincial director, for protecting a clandestine laboratory of methamphetamine hydrochloride, or shabu, in La Union, a senior government official said today.

Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) Director General Arturo Cacdac Jr. said that Judge Ferdinand Fe of Bauang, La Union Regional Trial Court Branch 67, convicted Police Superintendent Dionicio Borromeo, a bemedalled police officer, and Senior Police Officer 1 Joey Abang.

Borromeo, currently deputy provincial director of the Cavite Police Provincial Office, was sentenced with life imprisonment and was ordered to pay a fine of 10 million pesos (237,304 U.S. dollars). He was the chief of police in Dagupan City when the PDEA operatives and local police raided the shabu laboratory in Bimmotobot village, Naguilan town in La Union on July 9, 2008.

Abang was also sentenced to suffer the indeterminate sentence of 12 years and one day to a maximum of 20 years imprisonment and ordered to pay a fine of 500,000 pesos (11,865 U.S. dollars).

The two policemen were positively identified and implicated by Dante Palaganas, the caretaker of the illegal facility, who later turned into state witness.

They were convicted for violations of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.