Ex-Marine colonel’s murder linked to role in partylist group

MANILA, Philippines – Quezon City police investigators are looking into the possibility that Wednesday night’s killing of a 74-year-old former Marine colonel could be linked to his membership with a partylist organization disqualified from taking part in the recently concluded polls.

Senior Police Officer 4 Leonardo Pasco, chief investigator of the Quezon City Police District Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit (QCPD-CIDU), told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that victim Alfredo Ripoll, a retired Marine and owner of the ADS Digital Printing on Aurora Boulevard in Barangay (village) Kaunlaran, was the running representative of the Alab ng Pusong Pinoy (ALAB) partylist.

The group, Pasco said, was among organizations disqualified by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and that Ripoll had been receiving death threats purportedly because of his position at ALAB.

ALAB partylist is supposed to represent the senior citizens, particularly retirees as well as police and military veterans, in Central Luzon.

Pasco told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that Ripoll’s wife, Susan, had claimed that before the killing, her husband had been receiving death threats through text messages in his mobile phones. The mobile phones, the QCPD-CIDU chief investigator said, have been turned over to the anti-transnational crime division of the Camp Crame-based Criminal Investigation and Detection Group for “digital forensic examination.”

While police have been investigating the possibility that Ripoll’s death could be related to his affiliation with the partylist group, Pasco said they have not ruled out other possible angles in the killing, particularly robbery and personal vendetta.

Ripoll was shot dead on May 22 inside his printing office by one of three men, two of whom posed as customers. The shooter fired once at the retired military man, who was hit in the right side of the face and instantly killed. The killers then fled, casually boarding different passenger jeepneys passing along Aurora Boulevard.