Officer’s slay linked to Manila jail’s alleged drug trade

MANILA, Philippines - Investigators are looking into the possibility that one of the “mayores” or gang bosses at the Manila City Jail (MCJ) ordered the ambush of a jail officer in Sta. Cruz last month, officials said yesterday.

Jail warden Superintendent Lyndon Torres stepped down last week to pave the way for the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP). He said there is more than meets the eye to allegations of abuse made during the noise barrage at the jail, done mostly by members of the Sigue-Sigue Sputnik gang.

“It was actually a coverup because we have learned that they were responsible for the killing of (Senior Jail Officer 4 Benjamin) Signap. We have also tightened the security, which made it hard for them to smuggle their contraband into the detention cells,” Torres, a three-time recipient of the Warden of the Year Award, said.

A source in the jail said Signap was killed because he reportedly had an affair with “Apple,” the girlfriend of the Sputnik gang’s alleged boss, Gerry Roldan. Signap was ambushed by two men on a motorcycle when he stepped out of the MCJ.

Signap knew of the drug trade in the jail “because Apple was telling him what was happening inside,” the source said.

Homicide chief Inspector Steve Casimiro said the key to the solution of the case is Apple, but no one is sure if she is still visiting Roldan.

Casimiro said it is futile to question Roldan on the matter because “he will obviously give us the run-around,” but he promised to dig deeper.

‘Kakosa’

Mayor-elect and former President Joseph Estrada and re-elected Vice Mayor Isko Moreno visited the MCJ and talked to the inmates.

“Our conversation has been very lively because I even joked to the them that we are kakosas (fellow inmates),” Estrada said in a telephone interview. Estrada was under house arrest while on trial for plunder. He was convicted but was immediately granted a pardon by then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Estrada distributed 4,000 boxes of basic goods – toothpaste, soap, noodles, biscuits and rice – to the inmates, whose condition he described as “saddening. They are very much congested. They don’t have their own bed to sleep on and they lack toilets to relieve themselves.”

During the dialogue at the MCJ, which lasted three and a half hours, the inmates told Estrada that they have been suffering for the past two decades.

“The inmates only have P50 per day for their meals. They sometimes eat spoiled food,” he said.

Estrada also said the ratio of police officers to inmates is one police officer per 700 inmates. At present, the jail houses at least 4,200 inmates.

He vowed to assign more police officers to the jail and work for the construction of more toilets. – Rey Galupo, Jose Rodel Clapano