Declare Ecleo most wanted, Capitol urged

POLICE authorities asked the Cebu provincial government to declare cult leader Ruben Ecleo Jr. as the most wanted person in the province to place a cash bounty on his head.

Senior Supt. Jose Pante, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Central Visayas (CIDG-7), said a cash bounty on Ecleo will encourage people to provide information on his whereabouts.

He said the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) will release funds for the bounty.

Arrest warrants were also issued against Ecleo in several police offices and the CIDG counterparts in Mindanao.

Ecleo, Supreme Master of the Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association (PBMA) and a congressman of Dinagat Island, has two pending arrest warrants for parricide from the court and the Sandiganbayan.

In 2002, he was accused of masterminding the murder of his wife, Alona Bacolod, whose body was dumped in a ravine in Dalaguete town.

More than 20 people died during a raid that resulted in Ecleo’s arrest in his mansion in Dinagat Island that year. Correspondent Chito Aragon