Bohol PB wants jail guards guarded for selling drugs

TAGBILARAN CITY, Philippines  — The Bohol Provincial Board had approved a motion of PB Member Dionisio Balite to investigate provincial jail guards allegedly involved in the selling of illegal drugs.

This matter must be addressed before the Bohol District Jail becomes a full-time shabu trading center, said Balite who, during Friday’s session of the PB, said further: “Because we can no longer rely on our provincial guards, it is already incumbent upon the provincial government to hire another set of security guards with the sole duty of guarding these incumbent provincial guards.”

“Shabu is not only flourishing on the streets but also at the BDJ, and this should be investigated,” he said in his privilege speech.

Balite based his contention on the BDJ drug trade following the “recent discovery of a P300,000 worth of shabu at cell no. 4 of our very own Bureau of Jail Management and Penology.”

Balite said the discovery of the shabu trading at BDJ “worsened when a cell phone, allegedly owned by the newly-installed provincial warden Richard Laure, was found in the same cell where the greyhound inspection was conducted.

The BDJ is “easy prey to illegal drugs” because of the laxity of the jail guards, said Balite. “Illegal drugs are easily shoved into the detention cells in broad day light before the eyes of our guards and then ultimately secured tightly before being sold either to co-inmates or the guards themselves,” he said.

Earlier, Governor Edgar Chatto formed an investigating body, headed by provincial legal officer John Mitchell Boiser, to investigate the shabu trade inside the BDJ and the perpetrators punished.

The team of Boiser has started investigating some guards who were found to use illegal drugs. Their names were not divulged, as of press time.