Cell phones may provide clues to Delano ambush

Two cellular phones owned by the victim could be the key to solving the ambush that led to the death of Robert Delano, a police official said yesterday.

Superintendent Franklin Moises Mabanag, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit of the Quezon City Police District (QCPD) and head of the task force formed to solve Delano’s killing, cited an account of Compostela Valley Rep. Manuel “Wai Kurat” Zamora about an “unusually long” conversation that his chief-of-staff had the day before the ambush.

Mabanag noted that Delano had the telephone conversation while he was with his boss in Pulilan, Bulacan.

“We are deciphering his two cellular phones to determine the persons he talked to prior to the ambush,” Mabanag told reporters in an interview. The QCPD also released yesterday sketches of two of the three suspects who attacked Delano’s blue Toyota Fortuner as the victim was about to leave his home in Barangay Kamuning Wednesday morning.

Two witnesses said the suspect who shot Delano was a slim, brown-skinned man about 5’5” to 5’6” tall.

According to Mabanag, the investigation is now focused on identifying the assailants. He also noted that the three who attacked the victim were “professionals,” based on the manner they ambushed Delano.

Senior Inspector Dorothy Du, chief of the QCPD’s public information office, said the gunman’s first four shots hit the vehicle, but the suspect then opened the car door and shot Delano in the chin.

“There was tattooing (referring to traces of gunpowder) on the right arm of the victim, indicating that the firearm was very near him,” Mabanag said.

Investigators yesterday went to talk to Delano’s family and colleagues in Congress to determine any possible motive behind the attack.

Hours after the attack last Wednesday, a police source earlier said they were looking into the possibility that the ambush was related to “conflicting mining interests in Compostella Valley” or the victim’s “dealings in Congress as the president of the association of chiefs of staff.”

Mabanag yesterday said they would be talking to Delano’s colleagues and even Zamora to determine “the extent of his functions” as president of the association of chiefs of staff of the congressmen.