PNP ready to protect suspect who claimed sabungeros buried at Taal Lake
Philippine National Police (PNP) spokesperson Brig. Gen. Jean Fajardo in file photo. INQUIRER.net / ARNEL TACSON
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine National Police (PNP) is ready to protect the security guard accused of abducting 34 cockfighting enthusiasts or “sabungeros,” following his revelations that the victims had already been buried in Taal Lake.
The suspect, identified only as “Totoy,” made this revelation during an interview with GMA News, which was aired on Wednesday night.
“The PNP is ready to provide police assistance, including giving security to this new witness who just surfaced,” the agency’s spokesperson Brig. Gen. Jean Fajardo, speaking in Filipino, said in a phone interview with reporters in Camp Crame on Thursday.
READ: Technical divers eyed to look for missing sabungeros in Taal Lake
“The PNP is ready to coordinate with our friend in the media who interviewed them. We hope they will trust their national police,” she added.
As to whether the police will investigate Totoy’s claim, Fajardo explained that the suspect must first put the information he knows into an affidavit as part of the case build-up process.
“The Chief PNP is willing to go to the site himself and know exactly where this site is in Taal Lake as the place where the missing sabungeros were buried or brought,” the spokesperson stressed.
However, according to Fajardo, looking for the supposedly buried victims in Taal Lake would be a “challenge.”
“That’s a deep lake, and we may need divers if ever we need to retrieve them, and that will go through a process,” Fajardo said.
“It’s been years. If they really were buried there, we don’t expect that we will still see bodies there. If not, perhaps, only the remains or bones. It will take a long process,” she added.
