QC police solves murder mystery

Extreme jealousy reportedly drove a 35-year-old overseas worker to plot the murder and mutilate the body of her best friend.

In an attempt to hide the crime, she stuffed the cadaver in a suitcase and abandoned it in a taxi before flying to Dumaguete City last Wednesday.

But even before Grace Abuyador Cuba reached her final destination in Tagbilaran City, detectives of the Quezon City Police Department (QCPD) were able to establish her identity. Her name was flashed on the news, forcing her to surrender to the Tagbilaran City police in Bohol yesterday.

"The suspect claimed that the victim, Rosario Sarin, had a long distance love affair with her husband," QCPD director Chief Superintendent Nicasio Radovan told The STAR.

Radovan said homicide detectives led by Superintenent Procopio Lipania established the identity of the suspect hours after a taxi driver reported a headless human torso left inside his cab by a woman who hurriedly boarded an Air Philippines flight to Dumaguete City.

Superintendent Roger James Brillantes, chief of the District Intelligence Division, coordinated with airport authorities who provided the photos of the suspects as captured by the surveillance camera at the airport.

Initial police investigation said the suspect and the victim both worked as domesctic helpers in Taiwan.

According to initial police reports, Cuba arrived last month from Taiwan and learned that her husband, an OFW based in Italy, had contact with the victim. Their long distance exchanges of love messages reportedly drove Cuba to plot her friend’s death.

Cuba, however, denied that the murder was motivated by jealousy. She told authorities that her husband left her because Sarin spread rumors that she had a lover in Taiwan.

She added that the killing was not premeditated. But when she confronted Sarin about her relationship with her husband, it was Sarin who went wild and she merely acted in self defense.

According to Noeme Zeta, owner of the apartment along Riviera compound at Del Rey Subdivision in Barangay Baesa, the two women stayed in her apartment but later, the suspect was seen leaving the apartment with a big black suitcase.

Zeta said she did not notice any commotion during the night but a search yielded bloodstains in the bathroom, raising the possibility that the victim was killed and beheaded while taking a bath.

After chopping off the head and arms, Cuba allegedly packed the torso and boarded a taxi going to the airport. Police have yet to recover the head and arms of the victim.