PNP heightens security in Batangas schools amid child ‘kidnappings’

LOS BANOS, Laguna – The Batangas police has increased its visibility in public areas, particularly in school zones, amid the widespread spread of unverified reports of child abductions in the province that had sent parents into panic.

Since Friday, police officers were seen manning public schools in the towns of Bauan, Alitagtag and Cuenca and in the cities of Lipa and Batangas.

This was after panic-stricken parents came in droves at the Batangas National High School (BNHS), in Batangas City on Friday, to pick up their children midway through their classes.

BNHS school principal Lorna Ochoa described the parents as having acted “wild” after a text message circulated that another child was abducted. She said they had to call the local police to pacify the parents.

In a phone interview Sunday, Batangas police information officer Insp. Hazel Luma-ang said the “maximum police visibility” would continue until the case of the missing children is solved.

But she said the only case the police so far recognized as “confirmed” was that of the four children who went missing since August 27 in Bauan. She also clarified that minors Robin Cabral,14; Jerome Claveria, 12; Mica Recto, 11;  and Romar Manalo, 11, were considered “missing persons” and not victims of kidnapping as they could still not establish that an abduction took place.

The police had dismissed as “hoax” the other reports of minors that have allegedly been abducted.

Still, Luma-ang said that having four children missing raised the alarm in the police force.

The Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) regional police has stepped in by deploying forces from the Regional Public Safety Battalion to Batangas.

Senior Supt. Guillermo Lorenzo Eleazar, the regional police Chief of Staff, would also be taking over as head of the special investigation “Task Group Batang Anghel,” recently formed to verify the abduction reports.

Luma-ang said the increased police visibility in Batangas was in line with the directive of Philippine National Police Director General Ricardo Marquez to implement a 95-5 deployment, which means that 95 percent of the police force is deployed on the streets while only five percent remains in the police stations. JE