Police hopeful about solving slay of hotel exec

With the help of a bigger reward put up last week by the family of a slain hotel executive, the Makati City police said they hope to speed up the resolution of the case even with the disappearance of a vital witness.

In an interview, city police chief Senior Superintendent Froilan Bonifacio said the police investigation into the shooting of Sergio Mazza, a food and beverage executive at the Makati Shangri-la hotel, had been revitalized with the offer of more money.

“Hopefully this week, we will see the reward’s impact [on] our investigation,” Senior Supt. Froilan Bonifacio, Makati police told the Inquirer on Sunday.

“We hope possible informants will … visit [us] at the police station,” he said.

The investigation into the case involving the shooting and killing of Sergio Mazza, a food and beverage executive of the Makati Shangri-la Hotel last year, went nowhere after their informant recently disappeared without a trace or even an explanation.

The informant’s knowledge had been vital in piecing together sketches of the men who had shot the victim, according to probers.

All the police had was the informant’s phone number “and nothing else, because usually, these informants do not disclose to us everything about their identities,” Bonifacio said.

He added that the initial reward of P300,000 offered by Mazza’s family had led to a lot of interest among tipsters, including the missing informant.

Last week, the victim’s brother, Sandro, who is based in Italy, contacted the police and said the family was raising the reward money to P2 million.

Mazza was on his way to work on June 17 last year when a lone gunman shot him pointblank three times. Police ruled out robbery as a motive because the victim’s valuables were intact.