Former landlords of slain Iloilo crime bosses gunned down

INQUIRER.net PHOTO

ILOILO CITY, Philippines — Unidentified men gunned down a couple who owned the house where two of Iloilo’s most wanted men were killed by the police earlier this year.

Rex Develos and his wife Mel were walking home with their two children in Barangay Acuit, Barotac Nuevo town, when they were peppered with bullets at about 9 p.m., Sunday.

The victims were declared dead on arrival at the Barotac Nuevo District Hospital. The two children were unharmed and were placed under government custody.

The couple owned the house where most wanted persons Rolando Magno and Richard Cubarubias, were killed on January 26 in a joint operation by the Iloilo Provincial Police Office intelligence branch, the Iloilo Provincial Public Safety Company and the Barotac Nuevo police.

Magno was allegedly the leader of the Magno Criminal Gang.

Acuit Barangay chair Carlet Jimenez said the couple confided to them that they had received threats which prompted them to stay in different houses every night.

Magno and Cubarubias, of Dumarao town in Capiz, were tagged as behind the ambush-slay of Jun Apura, husband of Mayor Ligaya Apura of Lemery town in Iloilo, and his driver, Rodel Erat Lope, shortly before May 2013 elections.

The family of Magno and Cubarubias accused the couple of leading the police to their hideout that resulted in their deaths.