Village councilor linked to drugs slain in Cotabato

COTABATO CITY-Police authorities on Saturday morning killed a village councilor here, who was being served a search warrant, for allegedly putting up a violent resistance.

Law enforcers were serving a search warrant against Barangay Kalanganan Mother councilor Sadat Ayunan for drugs and drug possession but the village official pulled out a hand grenade, Senior Inspector Tirso Pascual, chief of the city police’s Station 2, said.

Ayunan was not able to remove the grenade’s pin as law enforcers were quick to react and shoot him, Pascual said.

“Our personnel quickly acted in self-defense,” Pascual told reporters of the 4 a.m. operation.

Recovered after the incident were several sachets of shabu and the grenade, he said.

Ayunan had recently been freed from jail after he was arrested last month for illegal drug peddling, Pascual said. But Ayunan’s family denied he had returned to pushing illegal drugs.

Pascual said a similar operation in Barangay Bagua also resulted in the arrest of four persons and at least six firearms had been recovered along with sachets of shabu.

All arrested suspects were now under police custody and charges for violation of the gun law and the anti-drugs law were being prepared against them.