Bullet-riddled pickup stolen from PAF officer

MANILA, Philippines - A bullet-riddled Mitsubishi Strada pick-up (RLY-330) abandoned near the Heritage Park Cemetery in Taguig City Sunday morning was stolen from a Philippine Air Force (PAF) officer in Quezon City last month, an official said yesterday.

Technical Sergeant Pablito Igne, a resident of Camp Aguinaldo, told investigators that his wife was driving the pickup along Scout Fuentebella street in Barangay Sacred Heart on Feb. 3 when it was taken from her by a group of armed men, Taguig police chief Senior Superintendent Arthur Felix Asis said.

Igne said he reported the carjacking to the Quezon City Police District.

Asis said four men on two motorcycles were seen fleeing from the area where the pickup was abandoned near the cemetery.

Recovered inside the pickup were seven slugs from a .40 caliber pistol.

Asis said neither bloodstains nor bodies were found inside the abandoned pickup.

The Southern Police District (SPD) also earlier reported that a driver’s license belonging to Sarah Jane Samonte, a 23-year-old Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) employee, was found inside the vehicle.

The SPD said Samonte, a resident of Lumban, Laguna, had reported her driver’s license as missing after snatchers on a motorcycle grabbed her handbag near the NAIA last Friday. Samonte is alive and well, police said.

Investigators are looking deeper into the case of the abandoned pickup, Asis said.