Alleged cop killer tagged in columnists’ murders

MANILA, Philippines - When Clemente Bersoza’s face figured in the surveillance footage of Chief Inspector Roderick Medrano’s killing, police investigators noted the man’s resemblance to a computer-generated image of an alleged gun-for-hire earlier charged for the killing of two tabloid columnists last year.

This was because Bersoza and Roel Manaog were tagged in the killing of Richard Kho and Bonifacio Loreto in July last year, Quezon City Police District (QCPD) director Chief Superintendent Richard Albano said yesterday.

“We immediately recognized him since he has figured in the case of Kho and Loreto,” said Inspector Elmer Monsalve, head of the QCPD’s homicide investigation section.

Albano said two counts of murder were filed against Bersoza and Manaog after they were identified by at least two witnesses who saw them allegedly fire their guns and kill the victims.

Loreto was publisher while Kho was executive editor of Aksyon Ngayon. Both of them wrote columns for the tabloid.

Witnesses in the killing of Kho and Loreto had picked out the two suspects from sketches and images on the rogues’ gallery presented to them by the police.

Monsalve said Bersoza was the man seen in the surveillance footage of Medrano’s ambush firing more shots at the already wounded Medrano on Monday.

“He (Bersoza) was the one who ran after Medrano’s car, then still moving, until it slammed into a nearby gate,” he said.

Bersoza, Larry Consolacion, Joean Marco and Rodener Necesito, who were arrested on Wednesday, were charged with murder yesterday for Medrano’s killing.

The motives behind both killings have yet to be determined though the men tagged in the cases were allegedly guns-for-hire.