Car similar to description of vehicle where beauty queen Catherine Camilon’s body was allegedly boarded found on November 10, 2023 in Batangas city. (Photo from PNP Public Information Office)
Police have recovered an abandoned sports utility vehicle (SUV) believed to be connected to the disappearance last month of Miss Grand Philippines 2023 candidate Catherine Camilon, according to the Philippine National Police.
In a video statement on Friday, the PNP-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Region 4A (CIDG-4A) found an unattended red Honda CRV, which was a subject to police search, at a vacant lot on Sitio Ilaya in Barangay Dumuclay, Batangas City, on Thursday night without its plate number and conduction sticker.
Police Col. Jacinto Malinao Jr., CIDG-4A head, said in a radio interview that the vehicle was taken to the Batangas Provincial Police Office in Batangas City for forensic examination.
Malinao said they were still waiting for the results from the scene of the crime operatives to determine if there were pieces of “biological trace evidence,” like hair or blood, found in the recovered car.
The recovery of the car came four days after two eyewitnesses surfaced and claimed that they saw three men carrying an unconscious female being transferred from a gray Nissan Juke into a red Honda SUV on the night of Oct. 12 while they were on their way to Bauan town.
Camilon, 26, went missing while driving a Nissan Juke car, with plate number NEI 2990, from her home in Barangay Rillo in Tuy town to Batangas City on Oct. 12.
The teacher-model was last seen inside a shopping mall in Lemery town at around 7 p.m. of Oct. 12. After this, Camilon told her mother in a text message that she was at a gasoline station in Bauan. There have been no updates from her since then.“According to them (eyewitnesses), one of the men confronted them at gunpoint while ordering them to leave the area immediately. Out of fear, the eyewitnesses hurriedly left the area,” the Police Regional Office (PRO-4A) said.
‘Not conclusive’
Malinao said they had identified the gun-toting person as a “civilian” who was “associated with the person of interest,” later identified as a police officer “in a relationship” with Camilon. The officer is now confined at the PRO-4A headquarters in Laguna.However, Malinao said the information was “not conclusive” even if the witnesses’ description of the Nissan Juke matched the car driven by Camilon.
“When they carried the body of the bloodied woman, her head hanging down and arms drooping, it did not mean that the woman was Catherine,” Malinao said in an interview on Thursday.
The Highway Patrol Group immediately launched a search for the two vehicles. Authorities have also offered a total of P250,000 to anyone who has credible information on Camilon’s whereabouts.
On Friday, Chin-Chin Manguera Camilon, Catherine’s older sister, challenged the police to name the “person of interest.”
“To be honest, you should release the name and face of the person of interest, but you can’t do it!” she said in a Facebook post.