The police on Monday filed frustrated murder charges against one of the suspects in the shooting of The Daily Tribune reporter Fernan Angeles following Faisal Sancopan’s arrest on Saturday.
“Since the charges were already filed and one of the suspects had been taken into police custody, we consider the case solved,” said Senior Superintendent Danilo Maligalig, Eastern Police District (EPD) acting chief district directorial staff.
Sancopan surrendered to authorities through Pasig City Councilor Rodrigo Asilo after he was tagged as one of the men who beat up and shot Angeles near the victim’s house on March 11.
Angeles has since been confined at Pasig City General Hospital for seven gunshot wounds and a broken arm.
Maligalig expressed hope that Sancopan’s arrest would erase the impression that EPD ranking officials were muddling the case after they announced last week that the reporter had a warrant for his arrest in connection with a drug-possession case filed against him last year.
“Our men worked hard to be able to track down the suspect. We were never remiss in our duties,” he told the Inquirer.
Maligalig reiterated that news about the arrest warrant only cropped up last week when reporters asked about it in a press briefing.
“We were compelled to tell the truth. What should we do with the warrant? We are likewise duty bound to serve it no matter whose name is on it,” he said.
Members of Special Investigation Task Group Angeles, however, have yet to determine the motive behind the attack on Angeles and if it was work-related.
“Why did you shoot and almost kill him?” Angeles’ wife, Gemma, asked Sancopan when she came face to face with him at the Pasig City Prosecutor’s Office before the inquest proceedings.
Sancopan, however, told her, “Why would I shoot him when I don’t even know him?”
A police official privy to the investigation who asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to media said that Sancopan was described in an intelligence report as a “level 4 drug dealer in the hierarchy of the illegal drugs trade.”
“He was selling a few grams of shabu [metamphetamine hydrochloride] to a small network of people,” he told the Inquirer.
“We are curious. What was Angeles doing at that time and in that place in the company of a known drug personality?” he said.
He admitted, however, that only Angeles himself would be able to shed light on the circumstances behind the attack on him.
The victim’s wife has repeatedly denied her husband’s involvement in the local drug trade.
According to her, the attempt on his life was work-related.
Authorities are still looking for two other suspects in the shooting of Angeles who were identified only as Basare and JR.