Child, 3 women massacred in remote Zamboanga del Sur town

Four people, including a pregnant woman and a 5-year-old boy, were murdered in an outskirt village of Kumalarang, Zamboanga del Sur, on Monday, police said yesterday.

Supt. Jose Bayani Gucela, Zamboanga del Sur police chief, said a suspect had been invited for questioning over the killings of Elizabeth Saquilabon, 58, the matriarch of the Saquilabon family; her daughters Kareen Anduhon, 21, who was pregnant, and Sheremae Saquilabon, 16; and 5-year-old Ryan Christian Ferolino, a son of Anduhon from a previous marriage.

Gucela declined to identify the suspect but said there could be other persons involved in the massacre that took place in Barangay Bogayo.

“We have in our custody a possible suspect,” he said.

Gucela said police are looking at two possible motives—robbery and a love triangle.

Insp. Aurelio Dolores Jara, operations officer of the police’s Scene of the Crime Operatives (Soco), said the victims suffered multiple stab and hack wounds.

He said the suspects, believed to be between three to four persons, stabbed and axed the victims to death while they were asleep. None of the female victims had been sexually abused, he said.

The murder weapons, Jara said, were recovered separately outside the residence of the victims.

He said investigators had theorized that the suspects had a drinking session near the victims’ house “because we discovered empty bottles of beer.” Jara said the victims apparently knew the suspects.

He said the house where the victims lived was far from the more populated part of the neighborhood.

“So when the attack took place no one was aware of what was happening,” he said.

Jara said the victims’ bodies were found on Tuesday “when somebody came for a visit.”

In pursing the love triangle angle, Jara said police learned that Sheremae Saquilabon, a high school band majorette, had a relationship with a lesbian. He said the relationship turned sour when the victim took a boyfriend.

“We are also looking at this angle,” Jara said.

Jara said police were gathering fingerprints from the empty bottles and traces of saliva for DNA tests. Reporting by Hernan dela Cruz, Inquirer Mindanao in Pagadian City