Guard stabs wife over alleged 3-year affair

MANILA, Philippines – A 29-year-old security guard stabbed dead his wife in their house in Sampaloc, Manila Thursday night over the woman’s alleged three-year illicit affair with another man. Police investigator Jonathan Bautista said Melissa Balagan, 28, a saleslady, was found at around 10:15 p.m. with three stab wounds in the neck.

The victim’s husband, Sotero Balagan Jr., assigned at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport terminal, was chased by neighbors who responded to the victim’s plea for help. Balagan later surrendered at the Ermita police station with the knife he used in the killing.

The victim’s sister, Mary Joyce, who witnessed the killing, said the couple quarreled when Sotero demanded P2,000 from his wife for the payment of an iPod he asked her to sell.

However, in an exclusive interview with the suspect at his detention cell at the Manila Police District homicide section, he said he killed his wife after she reneged on her promise to stop seeing her lover.

“I am aware of her relationship with another man. In fact, even her relatives knew of the illicit affair of my wife. They even urged me to talk to my wife and end the relationship since they are ashamed of what my wife had been doing,” Sotero told The STAR, adding the affair has been going on for three years. The couple has two children, aged seven and five.

Sotero said the last straw was when his wife’s uncle told him that his wife’s lover slept in their room the previous night while he was on duty.

Sotero said his wife’s uncle gave him the knife to confront the lover. However, the man was already gone when he arrived at their house, according to Sotero. He said he and his wife had a verbal altercation prior to the stabbing.

According to Chief Inspector Erwin Margarejo, who heads the MPD’s homicide section, a husband who catches his wife having sex with another man and kills her can suffer the penalty of banishment from his abode or “destierro.”

He said Sotero could only be charged with parricide with no bail since he did not catch his wife and her lover having sex, Margarejo said.