Pawned phone leads cops to killers of Bulacan teen

CAMP GEN ALEJO S. SANTOS, BULACAN – A mobile telephone, belonging to a 15-year-old girl, who was raped and murdered on August 7, was pawned last week, enabling the police to track down and arrest the victim’s suspected killers on Thursday (Aug. 16), according to the Bulacan police on Friday (Aug. 17).

Melvin Altubar and Melvin Marcelo of Pulilan town pawned the telephone of slain teen Angelica Calimlim to a woman for P700 on Aug. 8. The woman identified the two suspects to the police, said Supt. Erwin Tadeo, Pulilan chief of police.

Altubar and Marcelo have allegedly confessed to murdering Calimlim, whose remains were found on Aug. 13 in a creek in Barangay Dampol First.

The body surfaced when the creek overflowed due to monsoon rains and the floods that plagued Pulilan and other towns of Bulacan.

Altubar and Marcelo sexually assaulted Calimlim following a drinking spree at Altubar’s house in Dampol First, according to the police report. It says the two suspects stabbed then strangled the teen before dumping her body.

Calimlim’s family had informed village officials of their daughter’s disappearance. CARMELA REYES-ESTROPE