PNP chief wants cop in bribe scam dismissed from service

ILOILO CITY, Philippines -  – Number nine in the 10-point action plan of Philippine National Police Chief Director General Nicanor Bartolome is “strengthening the reward and disciplinary system.”

Bartolome said that discipline will remain a central focus of his leadership, as he ordered the dismissal of Inspector Nonito Venteroso Jr., 32, who was caught Monday in a police entrapment in front of a fast food chain where he allegedly got money he demanded from an applicant wanting to join the police force.

 “We will be quick in giving rewards to deserving personnel and acknowledging their good deeds, but we will also be swift and decisive in punishing the misfits and the undisciplined,” said Bartolome.

Chief Supt. Cipriano Querol, Jr., director of the Police Regional Office-6, said that Bartolome knew that Venteroso, Jr. did a grave offense, and should be dropped from the police force.

“I would personally supervise the filing of a case against him,” Querol assured, while Venteroso yesterday posted a bail of P60,000 for his provisional liberty.

Superintendent Robert Rodriguez, Regional Intelligence Division officer-in-charge, said Venteroso, operations officer of the Guimaras Police Provincial Office, allegedly asked P25,000 from police applicant Gavin Gonzales, a resident of Cuartero town in Capiz.

Gonzales sought the police for assistance and, during the entrapment, he only handed P10,000 to the policeman as “down payment.”

Reports had it that, as a “come on,” Venteroso assured police applicants that he would make a way for them to pass the neuro-psychiatric examination in exchange for P25,000.

Investigation showed that Venteroso did not, after all, dip his fingers to make them pass the examination, but secures instead a copy of those who already passed before it is revealed to the applicants. He then tell the passing applicant that the latter failed and offer his “service to let him or her pass. – (FREEMAN)