Ballacillo killer charged

The police filed double murder charges against the principal suspect in the killing of Assistant Solicitor General Nestor Ballacillo and his son, before the Parañaque Prosecutor’s Office yesterday.

Apart from the two counts of murder, a robbery case was also lodged against Cristo Rey Garcia, better known through his aliases, "Christopher Bermudez" and "Benjamin Garcia," before the office of Prosecutor Renato Garcia by the Parañaque City police and the National Bureau of Investigation.

Garcia was presented by Chief Superintendent Roberto Rosales, director of the Southern Police District, in a press briefing yesterday before the charges were filed.

Garcia was arrested last Dec. 20 at the Philippine General Hospital where he was recuperating from a gunshot wound.

He had been wounded in a robbery attempt. His intended victim managed to wrestle the gun from him and shoot him thrice, hitting him in the abdomen.

At least five witnesses have positively identified Garcia as one of the two gunmen in the Ballacillo murders.

Police records showed that Garcia was allegedly a notorious "police character" with at least 20 pending warrants of arrest for murder, frustrated murder, illegal drugs, car theft, robbery, among others committed in Cavite and Metro Manila.

Police are currently hunting down his accomplice.

Ballacillo and his son Benedict were waiting in Parañaque City for a car to pick them up for a meeting when two gunmen walked up to them and shot them.

Ballacillo had been arguing the government’s case in a legal battle over a terminal built by a consortium of Fraport AG and its Filipino partners in Philippine International Air Terminals Co. (Piatco).

In December 2005, Pasay City Regional Trial Court Judge Henrick Gingoyon — who had ordered the government to pay an initial P3 billion for the terminal — was ambushed and killed.

The $650-million terminal was built under a deal with the government in 1998.

But after President Arroyo came to office, she revoked the contract in 2002, citing what her advisers said were terms that were unfavorable to the government.

The government has since taken on the terminal, although a Pasay court has ordered it to pay Piatco compensation of an initial P3 billion.