2 dead, 2 wounded in bungled kidnap

COTABATO CITY, Philippines  – A soldier and a member of a local kidnapping gang were killed while a businesswoman and her daughter were wounded in a bungled kidnapping on Friday in North Upi, Maguindanao.

Senior Superintendent Marcelo Pintac, Maguindanao police director, identified the slain soldier as Pfc. Rey Enerio, a security escort of trader Justina Pari-an.

Enerio belonged to the Army’s 6th Infantry Battalion, a component unit of the 6th Infantry Division, which has jurisdiction over Maguindanao’s 36 towns.

Accompanied by Enerio, Pari-an and her daughter, Rona, were on their way to the town proper of North Upi from Cotabato City onboard a Toyota Vios when armed men flagged them down along the Cotabato-Upi Highway.

The armed men, however, opened fire at Pari-an’s car when they saw Enerio in the vehicle armed with an M-16 assault rifle.

Enerio was killed in the ensuing firefight while Pari-an and her daughter sustained gunshot wounds.

“It seems it was a kidnapping attempt because the gunmen tried to take the wounded businesswoman with them, but balked when they saw her bleeding,” Pintac said.

Upi officials said they earlier had warned Pari-an of persistent reports from confidential informants that a group of rogue Moro guerrillas was planning to kidnap her.

Pintac said responding policemen, civilian volunteers and soldiers figured in a running firefight with the fleeing kidnappers, killing one of them.

“Investigators are now trying to establish the identities of the gunmen so that corresponding criminal cases could be filed against them,” Pintac said.