"I will recommend the highest possible award for them," Franco told The STAR.
Metro police chief Director Ricardo de Leon also said Friday that officers who cracked the Tan case would be "appropriately awarded."
The Caloocan City police, led by Superintendent Dionicio Borromeo, were able to solve the Tan abduction and murder case exactly a week after the victim’s body was recovered in Norzagaray, Bulacan.
Four suspects, identified as Noel Papong, 38, Rodolfo Norombaba, 44, both of Minuyan, San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan, and sisters Mary Ann Medina and Maria Lourdes Medina-Olayres, in their early 30s, also natives of San Jose del Monte City, were arrested in a series of follow-up operations by the Caloocan and Bulacan police.
The sisters are being tagged by the police as masterminds in the murder of Tan, a 29-year-old manager of the family-owned plastics firm.
On the night of Jan. 9, Tan, aboard his dark blue Toyota Corolla (WJV-774) left their residence in Caloocan City. He reportedly failed to return since then..
He was observed talking to somebody on his cell phone as he boarded his car.
The following day, Tan’s vehicle was recovered on a vacant lot in San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan while his body was found dumped on a grassy area along the highway in Norzagaray also in Bulacan, with two gunshot wounds in the head.
The victim’s body was only identified by his family in a funeral parlor five days after it was recovered.
The local police started their indepth investigation and were able to trace the number of a cell phone of the last person Tan contacted the night he left his residence to that of Medina’s, the victim’s business associate for two years.
During initial investigation, Medina denied talking to Tan the night he disappeared. She also denied owning the cell phone number the police said she owned.
Police later learned that Medina changed her cell phone number after Tan’s murder was discovered. She later admitted participation in Tan’s killing. –Pete Laude