PAOCTF arrests 3 kidnap suspects

Police announced the arrest Thursday of three suspected members of a kidnap-for-ransom gang for the Nov. 12 abduction of a wealthy Pasay City Chinese trader’s daughter in operations in Tondo and Paco, Manila.

Arrested were Celso Palapar, of 0174, Building 7, Temporary Housing, Vitas Road, Tondo, Manila; Dr. Robert Yap of 497 Esco Compound, President Quirino Avenue, Paco and Jerry Morales.

Yap was the alleged financier of the group, agents of the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force (PAOCTF) said. They are now detained at the PAOCTF detention cell in Camp Crame on charges of kidnapping for ransom.

PAOCTF agents said Yap and his group abducted Fritz So, 21-year-old daughter of a Chinese hardware magnate in Pasay City. She was released unharmed on the evening of the same day after her family paid P1 million ransom to the group.

Heavily armed men abducted her past noon last Nov. 12 while she was tending their hardware store. So was dragged into a waiting Toyota car bearing license plates UHY-878 which turned out to have been stolen from a Honda Civic.

Initially, the group demanded P5 million ransom but negotiations reduced the amount to P1 million. After the pay-off, the victim’s family went to PAOCTF headquarters in Camp Crame to report the incident.

Its agents scored a breakthrough in the case and traced the telephone the kidnappers had used during ransom negotiations with the So family.

Eventually, PAOCTF agents tracked down Palapar in his Tondo residence and arrested him as he tried to escape. During interrogation, Palapar confessed his participation in the crime and tagged Yap as the financier of their group.

This led to the arrests of Yap and Morales, who identified the other members of the gang as a certain Johnny Bautista, leader of the group, Efren, Roy, Loloy, Charlie, Paran, Louis and Toyong.

Police also seized a Toyota Corolla with license plates TKW-952, a black Mitsubishi Adventure and a scooter from the suspects’ safehouses in Bacoor, Cavite and Metro Manila.

Aside from So’s kidnapping, Yap and his group were also linked to the kidnapping of Chinese trader Yap Hong Kong alias Alex Obeles only recently in Pasig City. The victim was freed after payment of P2 million ransom the PAOCTF said.