Veteran anti-kidnapping exec new Quezon police

Senior Supt. Ramil Montilla, the new director of Quezon police. Photo from PNP-Quezon

LUCENA CITY – A veteran officer from the Philippine National Police Anti-Kidnapping Group has been appointed as the new director of the police force in Quezon province.

Senior Supt. Ramil Montilla, a member of Philippine National Police Academy Class of 1993, replaced Senior Supt. Robert Arguelles in a hasty transfer of command at the headquarters of the Quezon police office in Camp Nakar here on Tuesday.

Arguelles held the position for only eight days after he replaced Senior Supt. Osmundo de Guzman, who was relieved from the post following the controversial killing of Christian Gayeta and Christopher Manalo in an alleged shootout with policemen in Tayabas City on March 14 based on a police report.

Gayeta was the son of Sariaya Mayor Marcelo Gayeta.

At least three policemen, one of them a senior police officer, were among the principal suspects behind the killing.

But according to the National Bureau of Investigation, the victims did not die in an encounter but were deliberately killed by the policemen in a stage-managed encounter.

Montilla has yet to face the media./lzb