MANILA, Philippines — The arrest warrants are out for former Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) chief Gerald Bantag and his deputy, Ricardo Zulueta, in the murder case of inmate Jun Villamor, the alleged middleman in the underground contract to kill radio broadcaster Percy Lapid.
Villamor was killed inside the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) in Muntinlupa City on the same day self-confessed gunman Joel Escorial was presented to media and admitted to carrying out the plot to eliminate Lapid last October.
Judge Gener Gito of the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court Branch 206 issued the arrest warrants on April 12, but their details were released to media only yesterday.
The non-bailable charges filed against Bantag and Zulueta in connection with the murder of Villamor on Oct. 18 are separate from the two ex-BuCor officials’ murder case in Las Piñas City over the fatal shooting of Lapid on Oct. 3.
Initially, Villamor’s death inside prison was declared as a result of heart hemorrhage, with the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI)’s autopsy report finding no sign of foul play.
However, a second autopsy conducted by renowned forensic pathologist Raquel Fortun concluded that Villamor supposedly died of “suffocation by means of a plastic bag over his head.”
In the course of the investigation, several inmates were suspected of carrying out Villamor’s execution in jail allegedly upon the orders of Bantag and Zulueta in a bid to silence him from divulging what he knew about the plan to kill Lapid since Escorial had already confessed.
Last month, the Department of Justice indicted Bantag and Zulueta for the murder of Lapid (real name: Percival Mabasa) who had targeted the BuCor chief’s lifestyle in his radio commentary.
The STAR tried to reach out to Bantag’s lawyer, Rocky Balisong, to comment on his client’s being wanted by authorities, but there was no response.
Yesterday, police tried to serve the warrant of arrest against Bantag at his two residences in Kaunlaran Village, Dagat-dagatan, Caloocan City, but he was not around.
Police Major Jeyrald Rivera told The STAR that the former prison chief’s neighbors said it has been years since they last spotted Bantag in the village.
Warrant officers from the Caloocan City Police Office, backed up by PNP-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group operatives, said only a caretaker was around when they visited Bantag’s houses.
Meanwhile, Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla welcomed the warrant put out by a Muntinlupa City court and advised Bantag and his former deputy in the BuCor “to face the music.”
“If you think you are innocent just come in to face the music,” Remulla said when asked by reporters what prosecutors would do if Bantag opts to make an appeal to the court instead of surrender.
He said the warrant of arrest was issued because “the wheels of justice are turning,” so he hopes Bantag would submit himself to the process and not hide or run away.
“The law has a protocol how to handle persons who will be arrested or who have to be arrested. So, we will let the protocol of the law, the way that it runs, run its course,” said the justice chief. “The judges will be able to know if the truth is there. They will know what’s true and what’s not.”
Sen. Risa Hontiveros also called on Bantag to surrender and cooperate with authorities in the investigation of Lapid’s murder, which she believes should be expanded.
“I urge General Bantag, being a former law enforcer himself, to cooperate with the authorities and do nothing to frustrate the administration of justice,” Hontiveros said.
“I also call on the Department of Justice and the National Bureau of Investigation to continue and expand their investigation beyond Bantag and Zulueta, to the ‘Ocho Boys’ and all individuals who are allegedly members of the mafia which facilitated Lapid’s murder and other crimes inside the New Bilibid Prison,” she said. – Neil Jayson Servallos, Mark Ernest Villeza, Cecille Suerte Felipe