Benz-riding robber arrested

A robbery suspect was arrested while driving a Mercedes-Benz in Quezon City on Wednesday.

Danilo Bugarin, a 37-year-old mechanic, was accosted by police operatives on Kamuning Road after Charisma Angelica Compas, a Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) trainee, identified him as one of the eight men who held her up at 3:50 a.m. the day before.

Compas and other trainees were walking to the BFP office when eight armed men on four motorcycles blocked their way and robbed them of their valuables.

However, Compas, who said she lost a cell phone worth P30,000, was able to get a copy of the footage taken by a closed-circuit television camera in the area where the robbery occurred.

She went to the police who were able to identify Bugarin because of his involvement in other theft cases.

They managed to find out the places he frequented and on Wednesday, they chanced upon him driving a Mercedes-Benz and parking it at a vulcanizing shop in the Kamuning area, said Superintendent Limuel Obon, Kamuning police station commander.

Compas later positively identified the mechanic as one of the eight robbers who took her and her fellow BFP trainees’ valuables at gunpoint.

Obon, meanwhile, said they were checking who the Benz belonged to because Bugarin failed to present the registration papers for the vehicle. Julie M. Aurelio