PNP chief Gen. Benjamin Acorda Jr. holds a press conference at Camp Crame, Quezon City on January 15, 2024. INQUIRER.net/ Faith Argosino
Updated on January 15, 2024 at 1:33 p.m.
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine National Police (PNP) has already dismissed from service Lt. Col. Mark Julio Abong — a police officer who was arrested for firing his gun outside a Quezon City bar in November last year.
PNP chief Gen. Benjamin Acorda Jr. on Monday said he already signed Abong’s dismissal order last December 18 in relation to a hit-and-run case in August 2022 that killed tricycle driver Joel Larosa and injured a passenger.
“As of this date, nai-serve na yung dismissal order. I already signed the dismissal order,” Acorda told reporters in a press conference.
(As of this date, we already served the dismissal order against Abong. I already signed the dismissal order.)
He added that Abong was found guilty of “grave misconduct and conduct unbecoming of a police officer,” which led to the issuance and signing of his dismissal order.
This came after Interior and Secretary Benjamin Abalos Jr. directed the PNP to issue the implementing orders on November 29 last year.
In a 10-page decision released on the same day, the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) upheld the August 24 decision and September 22 resolution of the National Police Commission (Napolcom) – Regional Appellate Board (RAB) dismissing Abong from service.
Based on the document, the erring official’s plea was denied “for lack of merit.”
Records showed that the RAB’s decision came after it denied Abong’s first appeal and affirmed the same ruling made by the Quezon City People’s Law Enforcement Board (PLEB) on the hit-and-run case, released in March last year.
Aside from the administrative cases filed against him, reports revealed that the tricycle driver’s family lodged homicide and damage to property complaints against Abong, accusing him and three other police officers of trying to whitewash the case by reportedly using his driver Ronald Centino as a scapegoat.
Regarding his gun-firing case, the PNP said its Legal Service department had already sent another administrative case against Abong before the Internal Affairs Service.
A day after DILG affirmed his dismissal on November 30, Quezon City Police District (QCPD) Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit chief Maj. Don Don Llapitan announced that Abong was granted temporary freedom after two local courts allowed him to post P177,000 bail.
Broken down, said QCPD said in a separate statement that Abong’s illegal discharge of firearms has a bail set of P120,000; violation of the gun ban or Omnibus Election Code with P36,000; maltreatment with P3,000; and direct assault upon an agent of person in authority with P18,000.
The dismissed officer was apprehended on November 26 along Scout Rallos corner Scout Tobias Street in Barangay Laging Handa for assaulting a bar server and harassing one of the customers outside the establishment by firing his gun twice.
