(2nd update, 11:38 a.m.) The National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) has ordered the relief of the entire police force in Caloocan City, its chief announced on Friday.
NCRPO Dir. Oscar Albayalde said policemen in Caloocan City Substations 2, 4, and 7 were first to be relieved.
“And in the coming days, we will be looking forward (to) the relief of all the personnel from the other substations,” Albayalde said in an interview with ABC-CBN News Channel.
“They will be retrained and they’ll be reassigned to other stations here in Metro Manila. They will not be able to go back to their position or their assignment in Caloocan,” he added.
Personnel from the Philippine National Police’s (PNP) regional public safety battalion will temporarily replace the sacked policemen who will be reshuffled in batches, the chief noted.
The directive came after the consecutive and dubious deaths of teens Kian delos Santos and Carl Angelo Arnaiz in the hands of Caloocan City policemen and the police’s warrantless raid at a house in the city.
Albayalde said the move has been planned since the death of Delos Santos to prove that the PNP does not tolerate abuse within its ranks.
“What we’re trying to show here (is we) do not condone any wrongdoings of our personnel in PNP,” he said.
The teens’ deaths, as well as that of Reynaldo de Guzman, have sparked public outrage and have drawn more criticisms against the government’s violent crackdown against illegal drugs.
Another teen from Caloocan, Michael Angelo Remecio, 16, was found dead in a creek in San Jose del Monte, Bulacan on Thursday with his hands bound with a nylon cord. /idl
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