‘Inside job’ seen in Western Union heist

INVESTIGATORS are looking into an “inside job” angle in Thursday’s daring heist pulled off by two armed men in a Western Union payout center in Elizabeth Mall in Cebu City.

Chief Inspector Romeo Santander, chief of City Intelligence Branch (CIB), said that the delay in reporting the incident to the mall security and the police has cast suspicion that the establishment’s employees were in cahoots with the robbers.

Vendors in a nearby handicraft accessories shop said they did not notice any commotion when the robbers struck between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m.

Santander and other police officials yesterday visited the crime scene.

Police took custody of the shop clerk’s mobile phones as part of the ongoing investigation to examine the messages and calls made there.

Libie Jade Vequilla Alkuino, branch head of the Western Union shop who has been working there for 15 years, said she fainted after the robbers fled.

She insisted that she was able to press the shop’s alarm button./Correspondent Chito O. Ragon