NBI conducts confirmatory test on cause of concert fatalities

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) on Wednesday said it is still in the process of doing confirmatory examination on the cause of death of two of the five people while attending a concert in Pasay last weekend.

Dr. Wilfredo Tierra, Assistant Chief of the NBI’s Medico-Legal Division, said they have an initial finding but they are still conducting a confirmatory examination before making a final report.

The NBI conducted three examinations—general toxicology test, dangerous drugs test and alcohol test.

READ: Drugs? Dehydration? Probe of Pasay concert deaths on

“We are verifying if there [is a] presence of illegal substance in the body of the two people [who died]. We took a representative tissue sections of the internal organs and body fluids, blood to determine the presence of any toxic or poisonous materials,” Tierra said in a phone interview.

In the general toxicology test, Tierra explained that it determines if there are poisonous substances in the body of the victim while the dangerous drugs test will determine if there are traces of illegal substance like marijuana, shabu, ecstacy, among others. The alcohol test determines the alcohol level in the body of the victim.

The NBI conducted an autopsy examination on two of the five people who died while attending the concert—Lance Garcia, 36 and Bianca Fontejon, 18.

Last Monday, NBI Chemical Forensics Division Executive Officer Felicisima Francisco said Garcia and Fontejon suffered extreme high blood pressure that caused heart ruptures.

READ: 2 of 5 concert fatalities died of massive heart attack – NBI

She added that they are still completing their examination on submitted specimens to determine if the victims have taken illegal drugs,  noting that there are indications in the victims’ blood.

The NBI’s Anti-Illegal Drugs Division and the Death Investigation Division are conducting a parallel investigation on the incident. RAM