PNP Chief Ronald Dela Rosa. Photo by RICHARD A. REYES/Philippine Daily Inquirer
Philippine National Police Director General Ronald dela Rosa on Monday announced the surrender of bigtime drug queen Lovely Adam Impal, one of the illegal drug suppliers of Eastern Visayas drug lord Kerwin Espinosa.
In a press conference, Dela Rosa said Impal was accompanied by Chief Supt. Agripino Javier, police chief of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, when she surrendered to him at Camp Crame.
Dela Rosa said that Impal was immediately brought to the Anti-Illegal Drugs Group (AIDG) for processing of her statement.
In a Senate hearing on illegal drugs, Espinosa had described Impal as a bigger name in the drug trade and one of his suppliers of illegal drugs.
Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency Northern Mindanao spokesperson Ben Kalibre was quoted in media reports as saying that Impal’s name had long been cropping up in police interrogations of arrested drug suspects and was even mentioned in several big antidrug operations across the region this year.
In previous Senate hearings, Espinosa had described Impal as a tall and mestiza-looking woman who has several houses in Cagayan de Oro City, Iligan City, Bukidnon province and Makati City.
Dela Rosa could not say if Impal would be telling the whole truth as far as the extent of her involvement and knowledge of the drug activities in the country was concerned.
“We still cannot determine that because she may be like Kerwin who is telling a half-truth. Iyong binibigay niya na impormasyon ay iyong alam lang niya na hindi masyadong makakadiin sa kaniya, iyong makakadiin sa kanya pinipigilan niya (The information she is giving is only what she knows will not incriminate her. She is keeping to herself those that will incriminate her). But in fairness to her, she surrendered,” Dela Rosa said.
He said he would just wait for the outcome of the AIDG investigation on Impal.
At the same time, Dela Rosa refused to comment on President Duterte’s admission that it was him who ordered the PNP chief to reinstate Supt. Marvin Marcos, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group Region 8 (CIDG-8), supposedly to enable the PNP to track down his illegal drug activities.
He said the President had already spoken on the issue so he had to shut up and consider the matter closed.