A 19-year-old inmate of the Mandaue City Jail yesterday slipped away from his jail guards after attending a court hearing at the Mandaue City Hall of Justice.
Ricky Andujar was earlier escorted to the Municipal Trial Circuit Court (MTCC) for a hearing on his case of illegal gun possession.
After the hearing, Andujar and two inmates were made to stand near the gate near the building entrance while waiting for other inmates to arrive from their hearings.
While the two guards were chatting about three meters away, Andujar disappeared.
A fellow inmate said Andujar had removed his handcuffs and orange inmate T-shirt and ran out the gate before boarding a jeepney at MC Briones Highway.
A manhunt was ordered for Andujar, a resident of barangay Talamban in Cebu City.
Senior Insp. Michael Anthony Bastes, chief of the Investigation and Detective Management Branch (IDMB), said one of the jail guards reportedly failed to handcuff Andujar properly.
“The handcuffs easily slipped from his wrists and he ran to the gate and outside the hall,” Bastes said.
Security guard Rodrigo Tulang confirmed this account. Tulang said one of the jail guards tried to go after Andujar but he was called by another jail guard to help secure the other inmates.
“He wouldn’t have escaped,” Tulang said, if the the guard had acted quickly.
Andujar was detained in the Mandaue City Jail last March on charges of illegal possession of firearms, illegal drug possession and as an accessory to a homicide case.
Andujar was previously arrested by Mandaue police after a woman complained that she was held up by two motorcycle-riding men in highway Jagobiao, Mandaue City on March 8.