Drug suspect gunned down in Boracay buy-bust operation

ILOILO CITY—Police gunned down a suspected drug pusher on world famous Boracay Island early Tuesday morning.

Rafe Diamante, 35, died from gunshot wounds after he allegedly shot Senior Insp. Jess Baylon, chief of the Boracay Tourist Assistance Center (BTAC), the island’s police force.

“He pulled a .38-revolver and fired at me but apparently the bullets were duds. I shot him before he was able to fire at me again,” Baylon told the INQUIRER in a telephone interview.

Baylon said he led a team composed of policemen from the BTAC, Provincial Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Group, Malay police station, Maritime Police Station and Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency in a buy-bust operation against Diamante.

Baylon, who acted as the buyer, met Diamante along the road in a mangrove area at Sitio Lugutan in Barangay Manoc-manoc around 4:57 a.m.

Baylon said he grabbed Diamante by the neck after the latter handed him sachets of suspected methamphetamine hydrochloride (shabu) but Diamente wrestled with the police official before they fell to the ground.

Diamante pulled his gun and shot Baylon before he was shot four times by the policeman.

Policemen also recovered from Diamante seven sachets of suspected shabu and the marked money amounting to P1,000.

Baylon said they had been looking for Diamante for three months after he escaped during a raid at his boarding house.

A native of Nueva Valencia in Guimaras, Diamante laid low for a month before operating again on the island, according to Baylon.

Policemen also arrested a suspected pusher in the capital town of Kalibo in Aklan Monday evening.

Ma. Luisa Inocencio, 48, was arrested in a buy-bust operation in Barangay Estancia around 8 p.m. by policemen from various units.

Confiscated from Inocencio were a sachet of suspected shabu and marked money amounting to P1,500, according to a report of the Aklan Provincial Police Office. JE/rga