Woman, 4 kids hacked to death

CAMP VICENTE LIM, Laguna – Five people, including four children, were hacked to death by a spurned admirer of one of the victims’ sister in Atimonan, Quezon Thursday night, police said.

Superintendent Ronnie Miralles, Atimonan police chief, identified the victims as Elizabeth de la Torre, 27, and her children Elisa, three; Arvin, five; and Aizlli Nicole, four months; and their neighbor Rose Marie San Juan, 12.

Police said the victims were on their way home after playing in a nearby peryahan when the suspect, Mario Banal, attacked them with a bolo at around 10 p.m.

Banal escaped, but was arrested in his house yesterday.

Banal admitted to the police that he killed the victims because he was angry with San Juan’s elder sister who he wanted to court but had ignored him.

Miralles said Banal initially planned to kill San Juan’s sister that night but he saw her accompanied by her father.

Distraught, Banal drank several bottles of beer at a nearby sari-sari store before turning his ire on San Juan as well as De la Torre and her three children, who just happened to be with her then.

Miralles said his men recovered the murder weapon and Banal’s bloodstained shirt in his house.

He said the suspect suffered wounds on the hands as the victims apparently fought back.