Pasay folk say cops killed drug suspect already wounded and surrendering

Photo by Dexter Cabalza

HER eyes red and puffy, Rachelle Bermoy was in between fits of weeping as she held her one-year-old child next to the casket of her live-in partner, Eric Sison.

“I just want justice for him,” the 18-year-old Bermoy told the Inquirer on Wednesday, a day after Sison was gunned down by a team from the Pasay City police.

As she spoke, a chick rested on top of the casket as part of the local custom for the dead. The wake was being held at a small chapel along Tripa de Galina creek in Pasay, a few steps from Sison’s residence on F. Munoz Street, where he was killed by the policemen then patrolling what was considered a “drug-prone area.”

According to the incident report by PO3 Alberto Barangas Jr. and PO3 Giovanni Arcinue, three officers from the Buendia precinct were approaching Sison and an unidentifed man near the creek when Sison suddenly drew a handgun and fired at the police.

The report said the lawmen returned fire, hitting Sison in his foot, but he still managed to run toward his place and hide on the roof of his neighbor’s three-story house.

As the officers closed in, Sison jumped to another roof but fell down. With the target cornered, the fatal shots followed.

Another neighbor, Felipe Matias, was hit in the shoulder by a stray bullet as he was getting his bicycle nearby.

Bermoy and the neighbors maintained that Sison was already surrendering yet he was still finished off.

The Inquirer obtained a report still unsigned by Pasay police chief, Senior Supt. Nolasco Bathan, but naming the patrol officers involved in the incident as PO1 Benigno Baladjay, PO1 Jan Erwin Isaac and PO1 Melford Olorosisimo. Bathan could not be reached for comment.

Chief Supt. Joey Goforth, the officer in charge for administration of the Pasay police, said they had yet to get the autopsy results on Sison but they initially counted 14 gunshot wounds, mostly on the lower half of the body.

Goforth said the three officers and the Buendia precinct commander Senior Insp. Oscar Pagulayan, were relieved of their posts and transferred to the Southern Police District headquarters in Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City, pending an investigation.

“Our police who are conducting police operations are authorized to use force. But their firearms should be used to subdue the suspect and the threat. We are conducting an investigation to see if there was an abuse on the side of the police,” Goforth said.

In a one-minute video shown to the Inquirer and shot by one of the neighbors, the police could be heard looking for Sison. An officer then said Sison was already wounded and would eventually come out of hiding.

In the latter part of the video, a woman was heard pleading with the police to stop shooting Sison. A man, who the neighbors said was Sison, was then heard shouting that he would already surrender — but the gunshots continued and eventually silenced him.

Goforth, however,  said that based on the officers’ affidavit, it was one of the policemen who shouted “susuko na, susuko na. (He’s surrendering).”

“Let us not prejudge our police [based on the video alone]. We could not see the actual threat happening. What we had seen are the backs of the police officers, looking for the suspect [while he is hiding],” Goforth said.

Bermoy her husband sustained at least 27 gunshot wounds, including some on the face and throat.

“How could they do that to my husband? He was wounded and already giving up. Why did they shoot him that many times?” she said.

Crime scene investigators said they recovered a .38-caliber revolver with two live rounds, two sachets of shabu, a cigarette pack containing four sachets of dried marijuana, and a glass tube also containing marijuana leaves.

Bermoy, however, insisted that her partner of four years was neither a drug user nor a pusher. “He was just a pedicab driver. That’s what he is doing so our family can survive,” she stressed.

According to a neighbor, Sison did not even know how to use a gun. “He was afraid of guns. How could he fire one and exchange shots with the police?”

While the neighbors did not deny there residents engaged in illegal activities in their area, they said Sison was not one of them.

While firm about seeking justice, Bermoy and the others admitted being afraid that the police officers would return and kill them next if they remain outspoken about Sison’s case.

“We were very afraid because the people here, most especially, the children were traumatized by what happened. We did not expect that police would fire that many shots in a place full of children,” said one neighbor, who recalled that the officers also pointed a gun at her.

At the Sison residence, where Eric first tried to hide, there were at least 10 children sleeping when the police entered.

“We have seen on TV what those officers do to people who get in their way–they kill them,” Bermoy said, referring to what happened last month to two drug suspects — a father and his son — in the custody of the Pasay police.

Bermoy said she would go to the National Bureau of Investigation and the Commission on Human Rights today (Aug. 25) to formally file complaints againts the Pasay police.

CHR officials went to the Pasay police on Wednesday afternoon and said they would look into Sison’s case even with no formal complaint being filed yet by his family.

Photo by Dexter Cabalza