'Shabu chemist' owns labs in Manila, Quezon City - PDEA

MANILA, Philippines – A Chinese national arrested during a raid on a clandestine drug laboratory in Cotabato City Thursday is allegedly the man who owns similar facilities shut down by anti-drug operatives in Metro Manila earlier this year, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) revealed yesterday.

PDEA Special Enforcement Service head Maj. Ferdinand Marcelino, who led the raid, tagged suspect Peter Chou as the “master chemist” of the so-called “Tiger Group of the Chinese Triad” operating in the country.

Maj. Valentino Lopez, head of PDEA’s Complaint and Reaction Unit, said that as a master chemist, Chou employs several junior chemists in the manufacturing facilities of the triad.

“He (Chou) is the owner of the past shabu laboratories that we have raided recently all over Metro Manila including those in Sta. Cruz (Manila) and Quezon City,” Lopez said during the presentation of the suspects at the PDEA headquarters yesterday.

Authorities also arrested Chou’s wife, Norhata Bombong, and driver Francis Kit Alonte.

PDEA Director General Dionisio Santiago said Chou has identified several other drug connections here in Metro Manila.

According to Marcelino, the suspect maintained the drug laboratory in the bedroom of his house, located a few blocks away from the house of the city mayor. He said the bedroom even has an exhaust system that leads the fumes from the chemicals to tubes connected to the ceiling.

Santiago said the laboratory can produce three kilos of shabu daily. “That’s 90 kilos a month. At P10 million per kilo, that’s roughly P1 billion monthly,” he said.

He added that Chou admitted to manufacturing “adulterated” shabu, which he said could be fatal when taken in by drug dependents. – Reinir Padua