Masbate top cop orders hunt for 1,000 fugitives

NAGA CITY—The top police official in Masbate has ordered a manhunt for the 1,080 fugitives on the “most wanted persons” list in the province.

Masbate provincial police director Senior Supt. Heriberto Olitoquit, who released the figure Thursday, said he ordered all police chiefs in the 20 towns and one city in Masbate to implement “Manhunt Charlie” and arrest the most wanted, most of whom are suspects in murder cases.

He said Masbate City topped the list with 128 most wanted persons, followed by the neighboring towns of Milagros at 105 and Baleno at 101. The number in these three areas represented 31 percent or nearly a third of the total on the list.

Olitoquit said that of the 20 towns, Cataingan, which is located 60 kilometers southeast of Masbate City, had the least number of wanted persons on the list at 27.

“Since January this year, 182 wanted persons have been arrested, which gives the Masbate police an apprehension rate of 85 percent higher than that of the same period last year,” he said.

Olitoquit said complaints have been filed against 28 arrested wanted persons.

He said the provincial government offered to give a P15,000-reward to anyone who could pinpoint the whereabouts of any of the top ten most wanted persons in Masbate, all of whom have pending murder cases against them.

Police identified the top ten most wanted persons in Masbate as: Elias Madrilejos, Pantaleo Bajandi, Godofredo Rufu, Benjamin Milla III, Noel Ompoc, Francis Balmes, Renel Capellan, Reynante Agotera, Eric Godinez and Danny Sayson.

Olitoquit said it was possible that most of the wanted persons had since left the province, hence the effort to locate them through informants.

“Informants may contact the Masbate police at hotline 0908-9809124,” he added.

Deemed by the Commission on Elections as a “hot spot” especially during local elections because of the presence of private armed groups and communist guerrillas, Masbate has the highest crime volume but the lowest rate of arrests made of wanted persons from among the six provinces in Bicol, police records show.

Several groups, among them the Liberal Party and the Masbate Advocates for Peace, have petitioned the Philippine National Police for an early suspension of gun-carrying privileges in the province a year before the 2013 midterm elections.