Davantes seen driving in CCTV clip; cops think ‘crime happened in Las Piñas’

The police have narrowed down the area where advertising manager Kristelle “Kae” Davantes may have been abducted before she was murdered.

“We are now looking at the area from Filinvest to Las Piñas (the victim’s home city). We are now considering that the crime happened in Las Piñas. We are reviewing if there are private CCTVs (closed circuit television cameras) along the area to her home,” said Chief Supt. Christopher Laxa, head of a task force created for the case.

In an interview on Wednesday, Laxa said investigators scored this “big breakthrough” thanks to a security camera footage submitted by the Muntinlupa police to the task force.

Muntinlupa City police chief Senior Supt. Roque Vega said the footage showed Davantes in her Toyota Altis exiting the C5 tollgate toward South Luzon Expressway at 1:19 a.m. and exiting at 1:31 a.m. at Filinvest heading toward Alabang-Zapote Road on Sept. 7.

Vega said Davantes was alone in the car and appeared relaxed.

Davantes was last seen alive by her friends as she drove out of a parking lot in Bonifacio Global City (BGC) at 1:07 a.m. The Taguig city police earlier said she may have taken C5 Road toward Sucat to get home at Moonwalk Village, Las Piñas.

Her body was found around 6 a.m. the same day under a bridge in Silang, Cavite province.

Police have since been reviewing CCTV clips from more than 40 establishments along the roads usually taken by Davantes to get home.

Laxa considered the find “a big breakthrough for the investigation.”

“At least we have eliminated the possibility that she was abducted on C5. This makes the area of focus for the investigation smaller,” he said.

The “blurry” footage needed to be enhanced to clearly show the driver, he said, but the investigators were convinced it was Davantes because of the car’s plate number and because the recording “was consistent with the time she left BGC.”

“This means she was still alive at the time,” Vega said. “Now, the question is what happened on Alabang-Zapote Road onward?” Vega said.