NBI braces for arrival of Michael Ray Aquino
The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is expected to tighten security for former Superintendent Michael Ray Aquino when he is extradited to the country due to possible threats to his life.
NBI Deputy Director for Intelligence Services and lawyer Ruel Lasala said his men have pinpointed possible threats against Aquino coming from at least three sources, including the mastermind behind the 2000 killing of Salvador Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito, but stressed that the reports are raw and are still for validation.
“This is part of the normal way of life for an active or even a retired police official,” Lasala explained, but said the NBI does not want to take chances.
He added that Aquino’s position in the defunct Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force (PAOCTF) as intelligence chief would naturally make him a target for vindication by large syndicates affected by the police unit’s operations in the past.
Lasala said that based on raw information, three groups could possibly pose threats against Aquino: remnants of a kidnap-for-ransom group that was neutralized by the PAOCTF; remnants of a transnational drug syndicate, the leaders of which were killed in an encounter with the police unit; and the mastermind in the Dacer-Corbito murder.
The NBI deputy director explained that the two first groups would naturally want to exact revenge for their fallen comrades. As for the third group, “He (Aquino) is considered a key to identifying the mastermind behind the killing. The mastermind might try to silence him,” Lasala told the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
He said the NBI had shared the raw information with its counterparts in the Philippine National Police, particularly the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, the Intelligence Group, as well as the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines for validation.
