Bulacan town mayor cleared of murder rap

SAN RAFAEL, Philippines—Mayor Cipriano Violago Jr. is now a free man, after a Bulacan regional trial court dismissed charges that he took part in the 2013 murder of a police officer.

The family of slain Police Officer 3 Rafael Bartolome, a member of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group  office in Malolos City, as well as witnesses to the murder, withdrew their complaint against the mayor, prompting Judge Crisostomo Danguilan in January to dismiss the charges, according to court documents that were released last week.

Court records showed that the mayor and the complainants drew up an out-of-court settlement.

Bartolome was shot dead in a private subdivision here in May last year.

Violago eluded arrest days before the May 13, 2013, midterm elections, when an arrest warrant was issued against him by a local court. He got a 60-day temporary restraining order (TRO) from the Court of Appeals (CA) that allowed him to proceed with his candidacy.

After winning and assuming his post as mayor, Violago again went into hiding for 16 days when the TRO lapsed in July.

He surprised everybody when he resurfaced at the municipal hall on the first week of August last year for his birthday celebration, where he said   the CA had granted him a preliminary injunction that prevented his arrest.

On March 27, Violago said he was able to secure protection through the CA because no clear evidence linked him to Bartolome’s murder.

In Nueva Ecija province, Judge Cyntha Florendo has reset the March 27 arraignment of former Pantabangan town Vice Mayor Romeo Borja Jr., who is facing a rape charge, to May 15. Florendo cited the absence of the prosecutor for her decision to postpone the arraignment.

Borja was arrested in Manila on March 5 on a charge of allegedly raping a beauty pageant contestant, who was 15 years old at that time, from May 2011 to November 2012.

Borja’s father, former Pantabangan Mayor Romeo Borja Sr., was arrested on Feb. 8 for the same rape charge, which the girl filed when she turned 17. Reports from Carmela Reyes-Estrope and Armand Galang, Inquirer Central Luzon