Car dealer’s alleged killer asks kin for forgiveness

In a face-to-face meeting Monday at Camp Vicente Lim in Calamba, Laguna, the man believed to have shot dead car dealer Venson Evangelista asked the victim’s father for forgiveness.

However, Rolando Talban denied that he shot Evangelista although he admitted that he was the one who had wrapped packing tape around the victim’s mouth, according to Evangelista’s father, Arsenio.

Evangelista was murdered and his body burned beyond recognition in January last year.

“He personally asked for forgiveness from me but he said that it was Jason Miranda who shot Venson,” Arsenio said.

He added that Talban—the suspected hit man of the Dominguez car theft gang—had also tagged a certain Joel alias “Mechanic” as the one who burned his son’s body.

Chief Superintendent James Melad, regional director of the Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) police, however, doubted Talban’s statement and said that an examination of the gun recovered from the suspect would reveal if its bullets match those recovered from the crime scene.

Melad said Talban’s arrest was “a big blow against the Dominguez syndicate and other carjacking groups.”

Talban was brought Monday to the regional police headquarters where he would be temporarily detained. Relatives of his victims, however, have requested that he be transferred to Camp Crame in Quezon City.

Arrested in Barangay Burol 1, Dasmariñas City, Cavite on

Aug. 29, he is being tagged in the murders of car dealers Evangelista and Emerson Lozano and Teresita Teaño.

In addition, he also faces several car theft, homicide and murder cases filed against him in Bulacan, Quezon City, Pampanga, Cavite and Batangas.

Senior Superintendent John Bulalacao, Cavite police director, said that Talban and his group maintained a safehouse in Dasmariñas City.

This was also the area where the police found the body of Alfred Mendiola, the star witness against brothers Raymond and Roger Dominguez, the alleged leaders of the car theft gang, in May.

Talban, however, denied that he was the one who killed Mendiola as he pointed to a man he identified as Roy Blanco, Bulalacao said.

“My family and the families of the other victims are very happy [about this development]. As I said, we should never be the permanent victims here,” Arsenio said.