2 robbers killed in shootout with police

MANILA, Philippines—Two men who allegedly robbed a taxi driver of his earnings were killed when they engaged responding policemen in a shootout early Saturday in Quezon City, police said.

After the encounter, a police official claimed, taxi drivers who passed by the crime scene on Dahlia Street in Barangay Greater Fairview said the unidentified slain men had victimized them in the past.

“At least four drivers who saw the suspects’ faces said they were also robbed by the suspects,” said Senior Superintendent Richard Albano, Quezon City Police District director.

One of the men was about 5’5″ tall, of slim build, with a “Sputnik” tattoo on his right shoulder and was clad in a red shirt and black jeans. The other suspect was 5’4″ with a lizard tattoo on the right chest and wore a blue shirt and black jeans.

Case investigator Police Officer 3 Erickson Isidro said the encounter happened at 2:40 a.m. along Dahlia Street, right after cabbie Pedro Mina was robbed by the suspects.

Mina told investigators that he was driving in the vicinity of Camaro and Pontiac Streets when the two men hopped aboard, pretending to be passengers.

Shortly after, the robbers announced the heist and seized his P2,500 earnings.

Not satisfied, the suspects made him strip off his clothes, leaving only his underwear and wrapping his head with packaging tape, police said.

The driver was then dragged out of the vehicle, after which the men sped off with his “Nebraska” taxi with license plate UWA 146.

According to the police, a resident saw the robbers aboard the taxi and alerted the Fairview police station to the heist.

A four-man police team was dispatched to the area and they chanced upon the taxi still near Dahlia Street corner Commonwealth Avenue.

Isidro said the two suspects, armed with guns, alighted from the cab, after which police operatives ordered them to give themselves up. But instead of surrendering, the two men allegedly fired at the lawmen, who shot back, killing the robbers.

Police recovered the suspects’ caliber .38 revolvers loaded with bullets in their hands.

Later on, Mina identified the slain suspects as the same ones who robbed him, police said.