Police catch car theft gang members

Authorities have scored yet again in their crackdown against car theft groups.

Days after seven suspected carjackers were killed in separate operations conducted in Makati and Quezon City, the police arrested on Friday the 21-year-old leader of a notorious car theft and robbery group and his cohorts.

Based on a police report, Edelberto Marteja—the leader of the Marteja-Briones gang—was collared near a gasoline station at the corner of Roosevelt and Quezon Avenues in Quezon City by members of the Quezon City Police’s District Anti-Carnapping Unit (DACU).

With him was the alleged co-leader of the group—Francis Briones—and three more members identified as Larry Fernandez, Ricky Fernandez and Mike Juval Dicatanungan.

The five were in a Honda hatchback which had been reported stolen in Bulacan province.

Chief Superintendent George Regis, Quezon City Police District (QCPD) director, said that the group, which operates in Metro Manila and the nearby regions of Central and Southern Luzon,  was responsible for at least 46 cases of car theft.

Earlier, the police described the gang as more dangerous than the one led by detained car theft suspects, brothers Roger and Raymond Dominguez.

Drug users

According to QCPD-DACU chief Supt. Ferdinand Villanueva, the group was more deadly because its members were believed to be drug users.

The gang was reported to be behind the carjacking of a white 2009 Mitsubishi Montero owned by Maria Maxima Garin at Loyola Heights in Quezon City in July.

Briones was positively identified by Ishmael de los Reyes, Garin’s driver, as the armed man who took the vehicle based on police photographs of suspected car thieves.

The group was also linked to the theft of a sport utility vehicle owned by Pasay Judge Racquelen Vasquez in front of her house in Barangay (village) Tandang Sora, Quezon City also last month.

Her driver, Marlon Quiocho, was shot dead when he fought off the men who took the Mitsubishi Montero (NGP 591).

The car was recently recovered in Pampanga.

Villanueva said the Marteja and the other gang members were arrested based on a tip.

He added that the operation came after two months of intelligence gathering and follow-up operations.