Bicol cop dismissed for negligence while assigned to Maguindanao

LEGAZPI CITY, Philippines—Philippine National Police Director General Nicanor Bartolome has dismissed the chief of police of Tabaco City in Albay for serious neglect of duty while he was chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group at the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao, a spokesperson for the Bicol police said on Wednesday.

Supt. Renato Bataller, PNP Bicol spokesman, said an investigative body at the PNP’s headquarters in Camp Crame found Supt. Nilo Berdin, Tabaco City police chief, guilty of serious neglect of duty when assorted ammunition worth P154,000 got lost under his custodial watch as CIDG head in ARMM.

“The ammunition was vital evidence in the ongoing Ampatuan massacre case being tried in a Manila court,” said Bataller.

Fifty eight people, including 32 journalists and other media workers, were killed in the Nov. 23, 2009 massacre blamed on members of the politically powerful Ampatuan clan that had ruled the province since 1986.

Bataller said Berdin became head of the CIDG in the ARMM  two weeks after the massacre.  In September 2011, Berdin was assigned to Daraga, Albay and to Tabaco City on July 16 this year.

Aside from an administrative case, Berdin also faces a criminal charge of qualified theft in connection with the missing ammunition, Bataller said.

Berdin said in a telephone interview Wednesday he had yet to receive the dismissal order from Bartolome. “What I have received was a copy of the decision made by the probe body signed by Bartolome,” he said.

Berdin said the case filed against him was fabricated as he could not have been assigned to Bicol if there was case pending against him.

Berdin said he was responsible for filing an administrative and criminal case against three police officers under him at the CIDG in the ARMM whom he alleged to have connived in the disappearance of the   ammunition.

He said there was “so much more to the case as there would be a lot of officials who would get caught in this mess.”

Berdin said that as a matter of due process he has 15 days to submit a motion for reconsideration to Bartolome.

If the motion is rejected, Berdin said, he could appeal the case to Interior and Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas and the Civil Service Commission.