LUCENA CITY –– Police arrested an armed drug suspect in a buy-bust operation Wednesday in the capital town of Santa Cruz in Laguna province.
Santa Cruz police said in a report that anti-narcotics agents nabbed Marilon Ortiz, 30, after he sold shabu (crystal meth) to an undercover police officer in a drug deal in Barangay Patimbao at 12:20 a.m.
The suspect yielded nine sachets of shabu worth P4,500 in the street market.
Authorities also found a loaded undocumented caliber .38 gun from the suspect.
According to police, drug syndicates are arming some of their peddlers for protection, aside from providing them free supplies of illegal drugs for personal use as incentives.
The police also confiscated a motorcycle believed to have been used by the suspect in his illegal drug trade.