Mayor uses cop’s affidavit on planted evidence

BACOLOD CITY—Mayor Magdaleno Peña of Pulupandan, Negros Occidental, is presenting a witness who he said can bolster claims that police planted evidence against him during a raid on his family’s ancestral house last May 2.

SPO1 Rosendo Bersal Jr. executed an affidavit saying that he and other policemen didn’t find any explosives when they raided the house in Barangay Ubay, Pulupandan.

He also claimed that the 90 firearms recovered from the ancestral house were covered with licenses.

The affidavit said the policeman was denying seeing explosives inside the house. “I was even surprised when I was informed about the alleged recovery of said explosives,” Bersal’s affidavit said.

Copies of the affidavit were distributed by Peña at a press conference on Thursday.

Pena said the guns that police seized were all licensed under four corporations. He said the explosives that police presented as evidence were planted.

Bersal, a policeman for 36 years, said in his affidavit that he was part of the team that searched the ancestral house.