The Philippine National Police said that it was premature to link the killing on Friday of the 69-year-old father of Chao Tiao Yumol to last weekend’s fatal attack on former Lamitan City Mayor Rosita Furigay for which he was accused of murder.
“So far, it is speculative to assume its direct relation to the shooting incident that happened last Sunday at the Ateneo de Manila University,” PNP public information office chief Police Brig. Gen. Roderick Augustus Alba told reporters on Friday.
Two men on a motorcycle gunned down Yumol’s father, Rolando, a retired policeman, around 6:30 a.m. on Friday outside his residence in Lamitan City.
Lawyer’s appeal
The killing occurred just five days after Yumol allegedly shot and killed Furigay, her aide Victor Capistrano and security guard Jeneven Bandiala of the Ateneo where she was to attend her daughter Hannah’s law school graduation. Hannah and the mother of a fellow graduate were wounded.
Yumol has been charged with three counts of murder, frustrated murder, car theft, illegal possession of firearms and malicious mischief in the attack on Furigay.
Quirino Esguerra, a lawyer for the Furigay family, cautioned the public against ascribing responsibility for the attack to his clients, or calling the killing of the elder Yumol a vendetta akin to “rido,” a family feud that often leads to revenge killings.
Esguerra said the former mayor and her husband, Roderick, who is now the mayor of Lamitan, “have always resorted to the legal processes to redress the violations against their rights” allegedly by Yumol.
“Hence, there is no truth to their supposed involvement” in the killing of Yumol’s father, Esguerra said.
Furigay and her husband have filed over 70 cyberlibel cases against Yumol for allegedly maligning their name on social media since 2019.
Esguerra also lamented that it took so long for Meta to delete Yumol’s posts on Facebook that caused “so much damage to the family.”
Meant to mislead
The Furigays themselves were shocked over the killing of Yumol’s father and were calling for a thorough investigation, he said.
The family, Esguerra added, was “not privy to events and incidents” in Lamitan as they were in Quezon City and still grieving. “Daughter Hannah is still in the hospital recuperating,” he said.PNP officer in charge Police Lt. Gen. Vicente Danao ordered Basilan police chief Col. Pedro Martirez Jr. to speed up the investigation of the elder Yumol’s killing.
Police Maj. Gen. Valeriano de Leon, the PNP director for operations, said that while the Ateneo shooting was included as an element in the investigation of the killing of Yumol’s father, all other angles would be carefully examined “to ensure that we will be running after the right people responsible for this attack.”
As a former investigator, De Leon said there were instances when some people who had a grudge against a person took advantage of the most recent troubles of their victim to carry out a revenge attack to mislead the authorities.
“We really have to establish the real motive in order to get the right person or persons behind this killing,” he said.
Daily security
Police Brig. Gen. Arthur Cabalona, the Muslim autonomous region police chief, said officers had been deployed since Sunday outside the house of Yumol’s father, who was advised to stay inside, after he allegedly received death threats.Cabalona told dzBB radio on Friday that the police had provided daily security for the victim. “Unfortunately, this morning, he went out of the house much earlier before the deployed police officers arrived,” he said.
According to Cabalona, Yumol’s father retired 13 years ago from the police service with a rank of SPO4 (equivalent to police executive master sergeant). He was carrying a .45-caliber pistol when he was attacked but was not able to fire it.
Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman condemned the killing of Yumol’s father and also appealed to the public to be calm and cautious in their social media posts.He pressed authorities to ensure that those behind the attack would be held accountable. “It is our hope that this latest act of violence would not progress into a series of violent actions,” Hataman said in a statement.
“Let us not allow killings to be normalized in our culture, especially that our innocent citizens are getting dragged into it,” he said. “It is not who we are as Basilenos, as Filipinos and as human beings.”
Hataman said the public must watch out for “those taking advantage of the situation and shift attention away from the call for justice.”
“Let us not pass judmgent or fan the feelings of each family who is grieving over what happened. Everyone is in mourning. Speculation or baseless accusations will not help, and will even be the cause of more violence,” he said. —WITH REPORTS FROM JULIE S. ALIPALA AND JULIE M. AURELIO
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