2 Laguna cops in trader’s slay surface

CAMP PACIANO RIZAL, Philippines—The two Laguna policemen tagged in the murder of Chinese-Filipino trader Lea Angeles Ng surfaced 10 days after they went on absence without leave due to their alleged involvement in the kidnap-slay case.

Police Officers 1 Gifford Signap and Otelio Santos Jr., accompanied by their direct superior, San Pedro City’s police chief Superintendent Kirby Kraft, “voluntarily” reported to the provincial police office in Sta. Cruz, Laguna, around 10 a.m. Monday, the Laguna police director, Senior Supt. Gilbert Cruz, said.

Cruz said the two policemen first met with Kraft earlier Monday before they went with him to the provincial police office.

“They said they came forward to clear their names. They neither confirmed nor denied any involvement (in Ng’s murder). They now have their own private lawyers,” Cruz added in a phone interview.

Cruz refused to give further information about the criminal case, which has been filed with the Department of Justice against the two policemen and a ranking police officer tagged as the alleged mastermind, Supt. Rommel Miranda.

The two police officers, however, would remain under the Laguna provincial police office’s restrictive custody as administrative charges would soon be filed against them, Cruz said.

The policemen’s administrative violations involved their sudden absence from duty and failure to surrender their service firearms, Cruz said.

Signap and Santos were tagged as accomplices in the murder of Ng, who disappeared in Quezon City on January 20 and whose body was found inside a septic tank in an abandoned warehouse in San Pedro, Laguna, on February 23.

Miranda, a former spokesman of the National Capital Region police, was relieved as deputy chief of the communications and electronic division division of the Regional Police Office in Central Visayas based in Cebu City after he was linked to the crime and had been directed to report to Camp Crame to face investigation.