PMMA reports abduction of female cadet

SAN NARCISO, Zambales — A female cadet of the Philippine Merchant Marine Academy (PMMA) was abducted Wednesday (March 2), an official of the academy said.

2nd Lt. Franco Ladica, PMMA’s chief officer, told the police they received a report of 4th Class Cadet Janina Bunagan Batil, 18, being taken at a bus stop in Barangay (village) Rizal in nearby San Antonio town at about 4 p.m.

Batil, a resident of Tabuk City in Kalinga province, left her boarding house in Barangay La Paz here at 2 p.m. to withdraw money from Land Bank, her landlady Rosenia Artap said.

Artap added that Batil told her she would also trace the passenger bus she previously took to find the belongings she left there.

PO3 Joseph Mar Baldo, investigator at the San Antonio police station, said that Batil’s mother, Regina, a resident of Tabuk City, received a text message from her daughter telling her that she was forced into a black tinted van carrying children.

This prompted the mother to report the incident to the PMMA’ s Board of Admission and Tabuk City police, Baldo said.

An investigation of the case has started, police said.  SFM