A female overseas Filipino worker was found dead from multiple stab wounds inside a parked car in Sta. Mesa, Manila Tuesday night.
Police identified the victim as Froilina Fang, 43, a solo parent, of Acacia Building, Hampsted Graden, V. Mapa Extension, Sta. Mesa. According to the victim’s siblings, their sister’s diamond ring and ¥90,000 were missing when her body was discovered.
Officer-on-case SPO2 Edmundo Cabal said that at around 11:30 p.m. security guard Sonny Dineros noticed an abandoned Toyota Revo (XCY-516) along Dupil street corner Aliw-iw street in Morningside Subdivision in Sta. Mesa which has been parked for more than 11 hours.
Out of curiousity, Dineros aimed a flashlight at the driver’s seat and saw a bloodied woman on the wheel. Together with barangay officials and police they opened the car and found the victim stabbed eight times mostly in the chest. Cabal said the victim had been dead for several hours already as blood on her chest had dried up.
Chief Inspector Dominador Arevalo Jr. who heads the homicide section of the Manila Police District said that some 12 hours before the victim’s body was discovered she visited her mother at the Lourdes Hospital in Sta. Mesa accompanied by a certain Joseph Sapelino. At around 1:30 p.m. she left the hospital to change her ¥90,000 at a money changer in Kalentong, Mandaluyong City. Before leaving, she reportedly handed P4,000 to Sapelino to give to her brother Michael. That was the last time the victim was seen alive, Arevalo said.
Police are looking at robbery as the prime motive for the killing. “The victim could have been waylaid by the suspect after exchanging her yen, then instructed her to drive around before killing her. We learned that the place where the car was found was not the usual route taken by the victim in going from the money changer to the hospital,” Arevalo said.
Police are also looking into reports that the victim had a companion when she exchanged her yen. “We will talk with the money changer staff for the description of the victim’s companion,” Arevalo said.