More jewelry, papers in Umapad dumpsite, police say

OTHER jewelry pieces that reportedly belonged to a Chinese businessman may still be found in the Umapad dumpsite, scavengers told Mandaue City police yesterday.

Scavengers Rodrigo Corta and Antonio Cuizon made the admission to Chief Insp. Anthony Bastes, chief of the Investigation and Detection Management Branch (IDMB) of the Mandaue City police.

Bastes said Corta told them that a backhoe dug out the blue sack containing the jewelry box being claimed by businessman Vicente Tan.

Corta and Cuizon had recovered some of the jewelry pieces in the dumpsite.

Corta had the jewelry pawned for cash worth more than P100,000.

He later turned over the jewelry to the police who then turned it over to Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes for custody.

“The jewelry box containing most of the jewelry that were recovered by police was supposedly burned. So it is possible that the rest of the jewelry may have been buried with other garbage in the dumpsite,” Bastes said.

Tan’s family also said they are still looking for important documents such as a bank passbook and a lot title that may have been dumped in the Umapad dumpsite.

The jewelry and the documents were supposedly cleaned out from Tan’s room and disposed as garbage by the househelps.

The Tan family was required to present more evidence to support their claim that they own the jewelry found in the Umapad dumpsite.

Mandaue City police also plan to invite the driver of the back hoe to verify Corta’s claims today. Correspondent Fe Marie Dumaboc