Ambush survivor sues Matobato

DIGOS CITY—Confessed hired killer Edgar Matobato, whom Sen. Leila de Lima presented as a witness during a Senate hearing on the reported extrajudicial killings in Davao City under then Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, is facing a charge of frustrated murder in connection with a 2014 ambush that wounded an agrarian reform adjudicator here.

Abeto Salcedo Jr., a retired adjudicator of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) in Southern Mindanao, was with his lawyer and agents from the National Bureau of Investigation when he filed a frustrated murder complaint against Matobato on Friday.

Salcedo said last week that he instantly recognized Matobato when he saw him during the televised Senate hearing as the man who shot him several times as he was emerging from the DAR provincial office here on Oct. 24, 2014.

“I cannot be mistaken,” he said, adding that only his car’s glass window separated him from the gunman.

Matobato, who had admitted to being a “gun-for-hire,” said during the Senate hearing that he had no involvement in the Salcedo slay try, saying he was under the Witness Protection Program at that time.

Assistant City Prosecutor Jehrameel Libre, who received Salcedo’s complaint, said they have 60 days to decide whether or not to pursue the case in court.

NBI sketch

Salcedo said he remembered Matobato well as the gunman “was very near” while he was shooting.

MATOBATO

“I could clearly see him, was able to picture in my mind the features of his face, his nose, the habitual expression of his mouth, and how he clipped his lips and hardened his lower jaw while shooting,” Salcedo said, adding that these same features helped the NBI produce a sketch of the then unidentified suspect a few days after the attack.

Salcedo sustained three gunshot wounds in the stomach and another on his left knee during the attack. Three of the bullets remained lodged in his body.

Witness

A witness, whom the Inquirer had talked to, said Matobato’s face “matched about 60 percent that of the gunman.”

He was about 10 meters away when the ambush on Salcedo took place, he added.

“Initially, I could not see the face of the gunman because it was covered with a face towel. But when he jumped on the motorcycle driven by another man, the face towel fell off one side of his face and that’s how I saw how he looked like. He looked similar to the drawing and (Matobato),” the witness said. Orlando Dinoy and Allan Nawal, Inquirer Mindanao