LEGAZPI CITY –– A former member of the New People’s Army (NPA) was shot and killed in Barcelona town in Sorsogon province on Sunday morning, a belated police report said Monday.
Major Christine Llorin, Barcelona police chief, reported that Raymundo Fombuena, 48, was sitting at the balcony of his house in Barangay San Antonio and talking to his neighbor when an unidentified gunman approached and shot him multiple times around 11 a.m.
He suffered from bullet wounds on his head that caused his instant death.
Fombuena’s neighbor, Rodel Balones, immediately ran away from the balcony and sought cover among the banana trees, but the two lookouts ordered him to drop to the ground.
The perpetrators immediately fled on a motorcycle driven by a certain Gerald Pura, a resident of Barangay Bentuco in Gubat town, the report said.
The police recovered 24 fired cartridge cases, and a fired bullet of caliber 5.56 mm gun and a misfired and two fired cartridge cases of caliber 9 mm gun.
In a statement, the NPA claimed responsibility for the killing.
Ka Samuel Guerrero, spokesperson of the Celso Minguez Command in Sorsogon, said Fombuena was an asset of the 31st Infantry Batallion of the Philippine Army.
“Mula pa noong 2018, naging masugid si Kaday (Fombuena) sa pagmomonitor sa kilos at presensya ng NPA sa mga baryo ng Barcelona at pag-uulat sa kanyang mga handler sa detatsment ng 31st IB sa Barangay Casay, Casiguran, Sorsogon,” Guerrero said.
(Since 2018, he had been monitoring the presence of the NPA in the villages of Barcelona and reporting it to his handlers in the 31st Infantry Batallion in Barangay Casay, Casiguran, Sorsogon.)