NCRPO director Chief Supt. Guillermo Eleazar and QCPD director Chief Supt. Joselito Esquivel interrogate the suspects of a robbery in Barangay Lourdes, Quezon City. INQUIRER.net photo / Gabriel Pabico Lalu
With the help of a security camera footage and the iPhone locator of one of the victims, five men believed to be behind recent robberies targeting car wash shops and restaurants in Quezon City and Caloocan were arrested on Wednesday night.
Chief Supt Guillermo Eleazar, National Capital Region Police Office director, said the suspects were tracked down about two hours after they robbed another car wash on Banawe Street, Barangay Lourdes, Quezon City.
2nd target skipped
One of the victims of the last robbery, Eleazar said, recognized the suspects as the men who entered Best Choice Car Wash at the corner of N. Roxas and Banawe Streets around 7 p.m. Wednesday. They reportedly took the customers’ valuables at gunpoint before fleeing on motorbikes.
Eleazar said the group was also out to rob a nearby restaurant but aborted the plan. One of the diners turned out to be a policeman—SPO3 Rommel Cordez of the PNP Crime Laboratory—who spotted the suspects and sent them fleeing.
Alerted teams from the Quezon City Police District led by Senior Insp. Allan dela Cruz and NCRPO’s special operations unit caught up with the suspects in front of a shopping mall on Tayuman, Manila, around 9 p.m.
Locator app
In a press briefing on Thursday, Dela Cruz said they were able to find the suspects thanks to the locator app of one of the stolen smart phones.
Eleazar identified those arrested as James Karl Vecina, 22, from Marilao, Bulacan; Danju San Diego, 20; Ting Jocson, 22, and Mark Anthony Laarinto, 23; and Jeffery Flores, 34—all from Manila. Two more suspects remain at large, the official added.
Later recovered from the group’s “safe house” in Sta. Cruz, Manila, were a Louis Vuitton bag and cell phones, a .45-caliber pistol, a .38-caliber revolver, and three motorbikes without license plates, the NCRPO said.
Dela Cruz said they may also be the group who held up customers at a Japanese restaurant in Barangay Laging Handa, Quezon City, early in June.
When presented to reporters, Flores admitted that his group had robbed two other establishments in Cubao and Caloocan.