Murder on a tugboat: ‘Sige, patayin mo ako!’

A boat engineer was hacked to death by his quartermaster on a tugboat Saturday night at Manila Harbour Centre in Tondo, Manila.

An eyewitness said the attacker, 40-year-old Julito Sibongga, threw the murder weapon into the water and jumped off the craft to escape after killing his superior, chief boat engineer Rio Billones, 44.

Sibongga was later apprehended by a civilian officer at the port and was turned over to the police.

Before the assault, the two men were heard having a heated argument onboard the tugboat Nicole, which was then on its way to North Harbour Centre, according to the boat captain Eliseo Sacedor.

“I heard Rio shouting ‘Patayin mo ako. Sige patayin mo (Go ahead, kill me),’” Sacedor said in his statement to the police.

Sacedor said he then saw Sibongga striking the victim with a bolo several times. The suspect then turned to Sacedor and seized his cell phone and handheld radio to prevent him from reporting the incident to authorities, the witness said.

Sibongga then ordered the boat captain to dock the tugboat at Manila Harbour Centre, tossed the bloodstained bolo into the water and jumped off the vessel.

Alerted to the commotion, Dominador Torres, an officer of Coastline Integrated Services Corp. who was then guarding barges at the area, ran after Sibongga and caught up with him, who was later turned over to the Manila Police District station in Balut, Tondo.—Maricar Brizuela