P6.8 million worth shabu seized from minor in Tawi-Tawi

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Anti-narcotics agents seized a kilo of shabu, costing P6.8 million, from a 13-year-old male courier entrapped in Barangay Simandaguit in Bongao town in Tawi-Tawi on Monday, May 1.

The entrapment operation by agents of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in Barangay Simandaguit on Monday was preceded by their arrest last Sunday of a 27-year-old tricycle driver, who also sold to them a kilo of shabu, worth P6.8 million, at one spot in a commercial hub in the center of Bongao, the capital town of Tawi-Tawi.

Edgar Jubay, director of PDEA-BARMM, told reporters on Tuesday that the male adolescent suspect was immediately held by their agents, led by Abraham Kalim, and policemen from units of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region after turning over to them shabu during a tradeoff at one area in Barangay Simandaguit.

The real target of the anti-narcotics operation was Namli Jilhani Saratul, who had eluded arrest, now the subject of a joint police and military manhunt.

Jubay said the entrapment operation that led to the confiscation of P6.8 million worth of shabu from the minor was laid with the help of municipal officials in Bongao and Tawi-Tawi Gov. Ysmael Ali and units in the province of PRO-BAR.

The suspect, being a minor, is now under the joint custody of employees of the Social Welfare Office of Bongao’s municipal government, personnel of the women and children’s section of the Tawi-Tawi Provincial Police Office and provincial officials of the Ministry of Social Services and Development-BARMM.

Jubay said the tricycle driver from whom their agents had seized P6.8 million worth of shabu during an operation on Monday afternoon in Bongao is now locked in a police detention facility in the municipality, awaiting prosecution for violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.