Brother of slain drug suspect tagged in PDEA agents’ ambush

ILIGAN CITY—Police have identified the mastermind of the ambush that killed five antidrug agents on Saturday, Oct. 5, to be the brother of a drug suspect who had been killed in a police drug bust.

Chief Insp. Christopher Cabugwang, head of the provincial drug enforcement unit, said witnesses pointed to William C. Gandawali, chair of Inudaran village of Tagoloan II town, as the mastermind of the attack on agents of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) in the village of Malna, Kapai town in Lanao del Sur.

Five PDEA agents were killed in the attack.

Drug bust kill

Police said Gandawali was the brother of Comayog Macapagal, who was on the government’s drug watch list and who was killed in a buy-bust operation in Marawi City on Aug. 8.

Cabugwang said a police team served a search warrant on Gandawali’s house in Inudaran on Wednesday. Gandawali was not around.

Judge Wenida M. Papandayan, executive judge of the 12th Judicial Region of the Regional Trial Court of Lanao del Sur in Marawi City, issued the warrant for illegal possession of firearms and ammunition.