NBI arrests 3 ‘assassins’

National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) operatives arrested three men claiming to be assassins hired to kill a company top executive after receiving marked money they demanded from him in exchange for not carrying out their plan.

Paul Gabunates, 34, Danilo Destura Sr., 31, and Bienvenido Seguinte, 41, whose criminal records show only violations of municipal ordinances, were collared in an entrapment operation by the NBI Special Task Force last Wednesday.

The three were also found to possess police auxiliary unit identification cards from Camp Crame. No guns, however, were found in their possession when nabbed inside a restaurant in a Pasig City mall at about 4 p.m.

Investigators seized a cellular phone from the group which they had been using, through text messaging, to threaten and negotiate with Edgar Angeles, executive director of a company that organizes tiangges in malls.

But the NBI is still trying to determine if the three were indeed hired killers or plain extortionists.

"When they met the victim to receive the money, they showed him his picture, saying it was provided to them by the one who hired them," said an NBI agent. – Jose Aravilla