Dacer murder suspect missing from Crame

The police officer who confessed participation in the November 2000 kidnapping-murder of prominent publicist Bubby Dacer is missing. Supt. Glenn Dumlao, who is supposed to be in custody of the PNP-Intelligence Group in Camp Crame, has not been accounted for since May 19. The PNP brass is keeping it under wraps, apparently for fear of sanctions while also bracing for a political plot.

High officials at Camp Crame insist Dumlao is "just around", yet can’t produce him either. The PNP-IG earlier told a reporter that Dumlao, who supposedly has turned state witness, only went on furlough with his family in Central Luzon. But other officers familiar with the case say he’s from Baguio and Nueva Vizcaya, and has no relatives in Central Luzon. One officer said the brass is praying that Dumlao would return soon, but that’s unlikely.

Dumlao was a member of the defunct Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force once headed by police general, now senator, Panfilo Lacson. Like Lacson, he is linked to the summary execution in May 1995 of 11 captured members of the Kuratong Baleleng robbery gang.

Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito were kidnapped in broad daylight along the South Expressway in Manila. Their burnt remains were found weeks later beside a creek in Indang, Cavite. Police initially picked up from the barrio seven drifters who pointed to PAOCTF operatives as having ordered the killing and torching of the bodies. Two arrested operatives in turn identified Dumlao as head of a PAOCTF team that, in compartmentalized military fashion, delivered the victims from the abductors to the executioners.

PAOCTF deputy chief Cesar Mancao and operations head Michael Ray Aquino were at first linked to the crime only by murmurs. When Dumlao surrendered to then-PNP-IG head Dir. Reynaldo Berroya in 2001, Mancao and Aquino fled to the US. They are being sought for extradition. Meanwhile, their appeal to quash a lower court’s arrest warrants pends in the Supreme Court.

Dumlao, despite denials of the PNP brass, apparently is now also in the US. A retired intelligence officer swore by A-! information that Dumlao is living "under an assumed name, complete with social security number" in San Francisco, California. Dumlao allegedly tried to see Lacson three weeks ago in Vancouver, Canada. But he and his companion were turned back at the border, the source said. It was not known if Lacson wished to meet with Dumlao in the first place.

The source said Dumlao left behind a sworn statement recanting his confession and his linking of Mancao and Aquino. The signing of the document was videotaped before lawyers, for the use of an opposition politician. In the affidavit, Dumlao claims that Gen. Victor Corpus, chief of the Intelligence Service-AFP who has accused Lacson of drug links, had forced him to implicate his superiors. Yet records show that he already had confessed when Corpus interviewed him months later about the Kuratong case. Dumlao also has derogatory words against NBI chief Reynaldo Wycoco, who investigated Lacson’s bank accounts in the US.

Corpus, when asked about it, was surprised that Dumlao actually has fled, but not that he will be blamed. He said two of four new Kuratong massacre witnesses are set to testify that Dumlao had volunteered to kill the captives that fateful dawn. The witnesses, both police officers now in ISAFP’s protective custody, were with the team that arrested the suspected robbers in Parañaque and brought them to Camp Crame. The case has not been moving. Lacson had asked the Supreme Court to quash it for double jeopardy, but the Tribunal remanded it to the Quezon City court. Lacson is appealing for reversal of the decision.

Corpus said he learned that a dismissed PNP officer had offered Dumlao P1 million to recant, and another P1 million to flee the country. On behalf of certain parties, the officer also offered the four new Kuratong massacre witnesses the same deal, but was turned down.

A Camp Crame officer confirmed Corpus’s information, adding that Dumlao’s escape should lead to a review of the PNP’s custody rules. For one, he said, Dumlao should not have been assigned to a handler who, it turns out, is a co-accused in the Kuratong case.

The officer said the escape seemed well-planned since Dumlao, like Mancao and Aquino, was able to get a fake passport. He said he wouldn’t be surprised if politicians exploit the escape to assail Malacañang. Lacson has been accusing the Arroyo administration of orchestrating the string of criminal investigations against him.

* * *

Two Filipinas recently were accorded international honors for lifetime achievements.

Amelia J. Gordon, former Olongapo mayor and assemblywoman, was named Woman of the Year by the Pearl Buck International. She is only the second Filipino to receive such recognition for humanitarian work. Former President Corazon Aquino was the honoree in 1995. Among others earlier given the award were Audrey Hepburn, Aung San Suu Kyi, and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Mrs. Gordon is the mother of Richard, the tourism secretary, and James, the Olongapo congressman. She has 54 adopted children, and was cited for her leadership of the Philippine National Red Cross and aiding abandoned Amerasian children around former US military bases in RP.

Former Senator Helena Benitez was inducted into the Democracy Hall of Fame International by the National Graduate University in Washington, DC. Now head of the Philippine Women’s University, she was cited for contributions to education and her work in the Philippine Senate and the United Nations.

Benited is the first woman to receive the award. Only two other leaders have been accorded the recognition: former US presidents Harry Truman and Ronald Reagan.

* * *

What’s the latest on the Estrada plunder trial? Find out from lawyers Dennis Villa Ignacio and Noel Malaya in Linawin Natin, tonight at 11 on IBC-13.

* * *

E-mail: [email protected]