QC cop stabbed, shot dead by drug suspect resisting arrest

MANILA, Philippines – A Quezon City policeman was stabbed several times before he was shot with his own gun by a suspected drug offender he was arresting Sunday morning.

Police Officer 1 Renato Tabago, assigned with the Quezon City Police District (QCPD) Batasan Hills station’s anti-illegal drugs unit, was declared dead on arrival by doctors of the Malvar General Hospital from multiple stab wounds in the body and a bullet wound in the head.

Tabago’s attacker escaped after the killing.

The victim’s colleagues, PO3 Heide Santelices and PO2 Allan Segua, were apparently expecting a routine arrest as they were securing the perimeter.

Senior Police Officer 1 Joselito Gagaza, of the QCPD Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit (CIDU), said the killing happened at around 9 a.m. on Sunday, at the Freedom Park along Samson Street in Barangay Batasan Hills.

Gagaza said that Tabago, his colleagues and a police informant had gone to the park to arrest a suspected drug peddler in the area. Tabago and the informant proceeded to accost the suspect while Santeciles and Segua acted as perimeter security.

According to the case investigator, just as Tabago grabbed hold of the suspect and announced the arrest, he was stabbed several times in the head and body with a gaff (a sharp metal spur attached to a rooster’s legs in cockfighting). When the policeman keeled over bloodied, the suspect grabbed his .40 service pistol and shot the policeman in the forehead.

The assailant then fled with the policeman’s gun. Santeciles and Segua tried to save their colleague by bringing him to the nearest medical facility but the effort proved futile. The case investigator said that Tabago had sustained five stab wounds in the head, chest and back and a gunshot wound in the head.

Gagaza told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that Tabago should not have accosted the suspect alone and that he should have had police backup with him. “The only person with him was a police informant. The victim apparently did not expect the suspect to resist arrest,” he said.