P300,000 bounty offered for Father Ventura’s killers

TUGUEGARAO CITY – Relatives of Fr. Mark Anthony Ventura, who was murdered after holding Sunday Mass in Gattaran town on April 29, have pooled together P200,000 for information that may help the police catch his killer.

The Cagayan regional police have added P100,000 to raise the bounty to P300,000 after releasing a police artist’s sketch of the primary suspect, said Chief Supt. Jose Mario Espino, Cagayan Valley police director.

The sketch describes the man who shot Ventura as a medium-built person, aged between 30 to 35-years-old, who sports a mole below his left eye and a birth mark on his right cheek.

A special task force formed to investigate the priest’s death had dropped the theories that Ventura was attacked for work-related issues as a director of the Lyceum of Aparri and for his anti-mining advocacy, and is now looking into the priest’s personal relationships and associates, Espino said.

The priest’s mobile telephone would also be checked to shed light on the attack, he said. 

Espino said the killer could have been a hired gun.