Suspect in 2014 North Cotabato bombing arrested

KORONADAL CITY, Philippines—Police authorities in Kabacan, North Cotabato announced on Tuesday the arrest of the primary suspect in the Nov. 2014 bombing there that killed a college student and wounded 17 others.

Senior Inspector Ronnie Cordero, Kabacan town police chief – in a radio interview – identified the suspect as Gardo Usop, 49.

Usop, also known as Gardo Sampulna, is a resident of Sitio Lumayong in Barangay Kayaga, also in Kabacan.

Cordero said Usop was arrested with the help of Barangay (village) Kayaga chair Bong Bacana.  The suspect did not resist arrest.

Usop’s arrest was backed by a warrant issued by Judge Alandrex Betoya of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 16. Charges of murder and frustrated murder had been filed against him at Betoya’s sala.

A powerful improvised bomb was set off at the stairs of the highway overpass in Poblacion, Kabacan on Nov. 16, 2014 that left Monique Mantawil, 19, a Development Communication student of University of Southern Mindanao (USM), dead.

READ: 1 killed, 16 wounded in bomb explosion in North Cotabato

Cordero said Usop was identified through witnesses’ accounts.

Two other suspects remained at large.