Batangas, Philippines – Charges have been filed against two of the four suspects in the killing of a Laguna lawyer four years ago, police said.
Senior Superintendent Rosauro Acio, Batangas police director, said murder charges were filed against suspect Primo Lopez following his arrest in his house in Barangay Poblacion, Padre Garcia, Batangas last July 29.
Lopez, considered one of the most wanted persons in Region 4, was nabbed by virtue of a warrant of arrest issued by Judge Antonio Manzano of Regional Trial Court Branch 37 in Calamba City, Laguna.
Lopez’s co-accused, Sandy Pamplona, was earlier arrested in Candelaria, Quezon.
Two more suspects, Lorenzo Pamplona and Florencio Morales, remain at large with P90,000 reward for their arrest, police said.
Acio said the four were tagged as the alleged killers of septuagenarian Demetrio Hilbero, a known law practitioner and former Laguna president of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines.
Hilbero was gunned down near his law office in Calamba City after attending Mass at the St. John the Baptist Church on June 16, 2007.
Witnesses said Hilbero was onboard his Toyota Corolla with his wife when four motorcycle-riding men approached him from behind and shot him with a caliber .45 pistol.
Hilbero, a supreme commander of the Knights of Rizal, was the political adviser of then mayoral candidate Joaquin Chipeco, who was pitted against Calamba City councilor Moises Morales in the 2007 polls.
Hilbero’s son, Laguna assistant prosecutor Allan Hilbero, believed that his father’s killing could be politically motivated.
He said his father – and some of his relatives, too – received a barrage of death threats after the elections. Chipeco beat Morales in the Calamba City mayoral race.