8 dead in Bulacan police antidrug operations

Another drug suspect lies dead in Pandi town, Bulacan province, after shooting it out with police during a drug raid. (Photo from the Bulacan Police Provincial Office)

Updated @ 11:19 p.m., March 3, 2019, to more details and a photo

CAMP GEN. ALEJO SANTOS, Bulacan — Eight men, most of them drug suspects, were killed in separate police operations in the province over the weekend in an apparent enforcement of President Duterte’s verbal instructions for authorities to conduct a “harsher” war on drugs.

Senior Supt. Chito Bersaluna, Bulacan police director, said the suspects resisted arrest and fired at policemen during buy-bust operations in the towns of San Rafael, Baliwag, Sta. Maria and Pandi and the City of San Jose del Monte.

Police said those killed were Marlon Garcia, Michael Vincent Agapito, Romarico Imperial, Joel Jason and Romer Marquez. Two others were identified only as alias “Raymond” and alias “Brix.”

Bersaluna said the suspects were on the police’s drug watch list and had been under their surveillance.

Recovered from them were plastic sachets containing suspected “shabu” (crystal meth), pistols, motorcycles and drug paraphernalia.

Checkpoint shooting

An unidentified man was also killed at the Commission on Elections checkpoint in Balagtas town after he reportedly engaged patrolling policemen in a shootout.

Last month, 17 drug suspects were killed in a series of buy-bust operations in Pulilan and San Ildefonso towns and Malolos, Meycauayan and San Jose del Monte cities.

Rowell Reynon, 47, a dismissed policeman from Guiguinto town, was killed after he fired at policemen during a buy-bust operation.

Reynon was first dismissed from the service in 2001 but was reinstated in 2002. In 2010, he was again dismissed for involvement in the illegal drug trade of the so-called “Alabang Boys.”

Police also seized more than P25 million worth of suspected shabu from two women during a buy-bust operation in Baliwag town on Feb. 21.

New players

The women, identified as Cristina Joan Webb Trinidad, 39, of San Rafael, and Ruth Francisco, 34, of Marilao town, were arrested.

Seized from them were cellphones, a weighing scale, drug paraphernalia and marked money used in the operation.

Bersaluna said the two women were not on the drug watch list and could be new but high-profile players in drug trafficking. /lzb /pdi