‘Las Piñas heist victims won’t help probers’

MANILA, Philippines - Investigators from the Las Piñas City police are having a hard time following up leads on a home invasion that occurred Sunday afternoon after the victims refused to give statements, a police official said yesterday.

Senior Inspector Romeo Britanico, chief of the city police’s station investigation and detective management office, told The STAR that the family of Dennis Cruz Guevara, account executive of the Philippines Graphic magazine, declined to give their statements to investigators assigned to the case.

“Maybe the family members were traumatized so we have to wait time until they are already prepared to give their statements,” he said.

Britanico said Scene of the Crime Operations personnel have processed the Guevara house in Greenview Subdivision, Pamplona 3.

He said they are also checking if there are surveillance cameras in the area and interviewing the victims’ neighbors.

According to initial reports, four men barged into the victims’ house Sunday afternoon, then bound, blindfolded and gagged Guevara, his wife, daughter and sister-in-law.

The robbers beat up Guevara and one tried to shoot him, but the gun jammed, the victim said.

Guevara said the armed men presented themselves as representatives of a telecommunications firm to the househelp of a neighbor across the street.

When the househelp refused them entry, they barged through the gate of the Guevara home, which was open at the time.

He said they took P250,000 worth of valuables with them. “They took everything they could carry: mobile phones, jewelry, appliances, laptops, my gun, even makeup and my daughter’s snacks,” Guevara said.