Wanted person slain for threatening to lob grenades to lawmen in Sultan Kudarat

The home-made pistol, ammunition and a hand grenade (inside the paper bag) were recovered beside the slain drug suspect Fernando Orpilla Jr in Lambayong, Sultan Kudarat. (PRO-12 photo)

KORONADAL CITY – Police killed a wanted man for violations of anti-drug law after he attempted to pull off the safety pin of a hand grenade he was holding during a law enforcement operation Monday dawn in Purok Namnama, Barangay Poblacion, Lamabayong, Sultan Kudarat.

Chief Supt. Eliseo Tam Rasco, police director for Central Mindanao, said joint police and Army personnel were to serve a search warrant against Fernando Orpilla, Jr at 2:30 a.m. but he refused and attempted to lob a hand grenade towards the lawmen.

Rasco said elements of the Sultan Kudarat Drug Enforcement Unit and 2nd Mechanized Infantry Battalion personnel first introduced themselves as law enforcers to Orpilla while still outside his residence.

But Orpilla yelled at lawmen not to enter his home or he will pull the safety pin of his grenade.

“If you arrest me I will throw my hand grenade and let it explode towards you,” Rasco quoted Orpilla as telling police officers.

This prompted the police to maneuver and managed to gain entry at the wanted man’s home.  He was holed up on the second floor of his home.

He repeatedly told police not to arrest him since he had done nothing wrong.

“If you go here upstairs I will really let this hand grenade explode and we will all die here,” he warned police officers for the second time.

Rasco said the law enforcers maintained maximum tolerance as they slowly climbed up the second floor of Ospilla’s home.

“Our troops repeatedly appealed to him to peacefully surrender, to no avail,” Rasco said in a statement.

As soon as the troops entered his room, they saw Orpilla holding a homemade pistol in his right hand aimed at them and a hand grenade on the other hand.

A police shot him in his leg but, Rasco said, Orpilla pulled the safety pin of the grenade, forcing law enforcers to shot him more.

The scene-of-the-crime operatives recovered a home-made pistol with gauge 20 bullet, a fragmentation grenade and three empty shells for 9mm pistol fired by law enforcers./lb