QC cops catch suspect in killing of Masculados member, seaman

The Quezon City police arrested on Friday afternoon one of the suspects in the murders of a member of an all-male entertainment group and an overseas Filipino worker.

Based on a tip from an informant, Kristopher Kyle Ernie was caught by members of the Quezon City Police District’s (QCPD) anticar theft unit at a vacant lot on Atherton Street in Barangay Santa Lucia at 4:30 p.m. on Friday.

Ernie was arrested based on a warrant issued by Judge Ma. Conchita Lucero-De Mesa of the Binangonan Regional Trial Court Branch 70. He is facing a charge of car theft with homicide for his alleged involvement in the killing of “Masculados Dos” member Marcelo “Ozu” Ong on Aug. 2, 2015.

Ong was shot in the chest while driving his Toyota Hilux pickup (AAO 2722). The vehicle has yet to be recovered.

Chief Supt. Guillermo Lorenzo Eleazar, QCPD director, said that Ernie was earlier arrested in September 2015 after he and three other cohorts were caught using the Subaru Forester of seaman Arnest John Agbayani whose body was found on a highway in Tagaytay City on Aug. 18, 2015. The suspects were then charged with car theft and illegal possession of firearms and prohibited drugs.

Agbayani, who lived in Angono town in Rizal province, was reported missing by his family two days before his body was found. When Agbayani’s Subaru Forester (AIA 6237) was recovered by police, it had been repainted.

Following his arrest in 2015, Ernie confessed that he was an accomplice in Ong’s killing which was supposedly masterminded by a certain Jaime Ilano. Ernie, however, kept mum on the Agbayani case.

In March 2016, Ernie was able to post bail. Eleazar, meanwhile, said that they have yet to establish Ernie and his cohorts’ motive for killing Agbayani and Ong and if they were part of a criminal syndicate.