Cop denies Cabinet exec interceding to clear policeman in King’s slay

DAVAO CITY, Philippines – What Malacañang hand?

This was what Senior Superintendent Camilo Cascolan, chief of staff of the Southern Mindanao Police Office, asked when confronted about reports here on the alleged intercession of an unidentified Cabinet official to get Superintendent Leonardo Felonia off the hook in connection with the murder of businessman Richard King.

Felonia, former chief of the Philippine National Police’s Intelligence Group for Southern Mindanao, was identified by the three King murder suspects as the one who paid and ordered them to kill the Cebu hotelier on June 12.

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Self-confessed triggerman Paul Dave Labang, and his alleged accomplice, siblings Rommel and Rodel dela Cerna, who worked at the Laud Firing Range in Barangay (village) Maa here, said Felonia personally handed them the money for the job.

Like Felonia, all three also face murder charges.

“There was no truth to that,” Cascolan said of the alleged intercession by the unnamed Cabinet official. The origin of the report was also unclear as some media outfits here attributed it to unnamed sources.

Cascolan said as far as the police were concerned, there were no efforts to muddle the case against Felonia.

There was no truth either to reports that Felonia has been freely moving in and out of Camp Crame, he said.

Since being linked to the King murder case, Felonia has been under restrictive custody of the PNP-IG in Camp Crame.

Cascolan said the Bureau of Immigration Davao has already issued the lookout bulletin against Felonia after the Special Investigation Task Group (SITG) King filed the request in a bid to prevent the police official from slipping out of the country.

“This means that he cannot go out of Camp Crame without the authority of the PNP Chief (Allan La. Purisima),” he said.

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