4 hurt in grenade blast after CamSur hostage drama
PILI, Camarines Sur-—Four more people were injured, including a policeman, in a grenade explosion while police were undertaking a clearing operation at the end of the 10-hour hostage taking incident in Barangay (village) San Roque of this town that had left five people dead.
Personnel from a funeral parlor, accompanied by a policeman, went inside the Zepeda compound to retrieve the dead at around 7:15 p.m. but were instead greeted with a loud explosion, from a live grenade left behind by hostage taker Anthony Zepeda, 35, before he shot himself in the head.
The funeral parlor personnel, accompanied by a police investigator, were lifting the body of Zepeda from a sitting position at the ground floor of the house when a grenade exploded. Apparently, Zepeda was sitting on a grenade that exploded soon after his body was lifted, according to Police Officer 1 Gerald Corporal, one of the policemen assigned in the post-hostage taking operation.
He said one of the funeral parlor personnel, who was yet to be identified, was critically wounded. Also wounded was P03 Jose Benito, the case investigator from the Pili police, while the two other funeral parlor worker were hit by shrapnel and sustained minor wounds, he said.
The retrieval operation was suspended while police were clearing the area for other possible explosive devices that Zepeda might have left behind, said Corporal.
Senior Supt. Ramiro Bausa, provincial police chief, earlier said that hostage-taker Zepeda, 35, shot himself in the head with a .45-cal. pistol after shooting to death his father Expedito, who was in his 70s, his older brother Victor, who was in his 40s, the latter’s wife Sharmaine, and an unidentified househelp.
The remains of the slain family members were on the second floor of the house while Anthony was believed to have committed suicide based on the last shot that rang out from the ground floor of the house at around 4:15 p.m., Corporal said.
Corporal said their initial investigation showed that Anthony was suffering from depression after he separated from his wife. Anthony and his wife have three children but there was no information as to whereabouts of the children and the wife, Corporal said.
Bausa said the hostage crisis team tried to negotiate with Anthony but the negotiation did not take off after Anthony’s refused to talk with the team.
“Our last communication with the hostage-taker was at 12:15 noontime,” said Bausa.
He said a female relative of the Zepeda family told police she called up the house at around this time and was told the five persons inside the house had already eaten.
Bausa said they stood their ground outside the house but at 4:15 p.m. the police heard two gunshots that rang from inside the house.
“The police team then stormed the house and found the four dead bodies inside a room in the second floor,” he said.
Anthony’s body was found on the ground floor, said Corporal.
Scene of Crime Operatives were still conducting an investigation as of posting time.
Police believed the hostage drama started to unfold at 6 a.m. while each family member was preparing to take their breakfast.
Senior Insp. Benjamin Spaña, Pili police chief, in an interview, said a second house helper, whom he identified as Gello Gallardo, 14, was able to flee when tension heightened during the family’s breakfast at past 9 a.m.
Gallardo told police that before he fled the house Expedito and Anthony were arguing and he saw Anthony hit his father with a chair.
Rogelio Regondola, vice mayor of Pili, who headed the hostage crisis committee, had identified five persons who were left behind inside the house that included Anthony, his father, brother, the latter’s wife and the unnamed househelp.
Spaña said Anthony had also fired a gun indiscriminately, wounding three persons. Two of the injured were identified as Rubilyn Adizas who sustained a wound in the abdomen and Rene Becensio who was hit by a bullet in the shoulders. It was still unclear where the three injured persons were located when Anthony started to fire shots.
The hostage-taking happened in a one-hectare compound where a facility for the production of animal feeds owned by the family is located, added Spaña.
Traffic was rerouted to the diversion road as motorists were prevented from entering the town center of Pili while the hostage-taking occurred.
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