Former BuCor chief Gerald Bantag (INQUIRER FILE PHOTO)
Former Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) Director General Gerald Bantag, who is wanted for the October 2022 killing of radio broadcaster Percival “Percy Lapid” Mabasa and New Bilibid Prison (NBP) inmate Cristito “Jun Villamor” Palaña, has already sent surrender feelers, Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said on Thursday.
“He (Bantag) spoke to one of my colleagues in the Cabinet to say that he may wish to surrender. I was just told by a colleague that he received a call from [Bantag] asking if surrender was possible,” Remulla said, adding that the call was made last weekend.
“You know it is very difficult to hide from the law,” he said, adding that he would talk with his colleague again to ask if the offer was followed up by another gesture.
Two courts—the Las Piñas City and Muntinlupa City regional trial courts—have issued warrants of arrest against Bantag for the two killings.
Aside from Bantag, also charged in the two murder cases were former BuCor security officer Ricardo Zulueta and several inmates of NBP.
Asked if Zulueta also expressed intentions to surrender, the justice secretary said: “It was only Bantag who called up. I don’t know about Zulueta,” he said.
Mabasa, who was a critic of Bantag on his online radio show, was shot to death in Las Piñas City, on Oct. 3, by a motorcycle-riding assailant.
On Oct. 17, confessed gunman Joel Escorial surrendered to the authorities and said at a press conference on the following day that Palaña, an inmate at NBP, contracted him to kill Mabasa for P550,000.
Just hours after the press conference at the Philippine National Police headquarters, Palaña was found dead at NBP.
Medicolegal experts from the National Bureau of Investigation said in their autopsy report that they found “no apparent external injuries” on Palaña, suggesting that he died of natural causes.
However, forensic pathologist Dr. Raquel Fortun performed a second autopsy and determined that Palaña was suffocated to death with a plastic bag placed over his head.
READ: Muntinlupa court orders arrest of ex-BuCor chief Bantag for murder of Bilibid inmate