Manila cops gaining ground on Oriental woman’s murder

MANILA, Philippines—The Manila police’s homicide section said Sunday it was in hot pursuit of the man who ran over and stabbed dead a yet to be identified Oriental-looking woman in Malate district early Saturday.

The homicide section has coordinated with the Land Transportation Office in tracing the black car driven by a man, also reportedly with Oriental features. Before the violent incident on the Roxas Boulevard service road, the woman had routinely been seen jogging in the area trailed by the man in his black car.

While admitting that they had gotten hold of the car’s plate number, investigators declined to publicize more details on their lead on the suspect, fearing that it might affect their pursuit operations.

From the information gathered, however, the suspect is believed to be Korean or have connections with Koreans here in the Philippines. Identifying the suspect may help identify the victim.

The Korean Embassy, however, doubted that the victim is Korean, after reviewing the contents of her Lenovo cellphone and finding out that the characters she used were Chinese, not Korean, homicide section chief Inspector Joselito de Ocampo said.

The embassy’s representatives, however, still asked for fingerprints of the victim to countercheck if she is on their records.

Police are also analyzing the blood on a 10-inch steel knife recovered from the scene of the crime.

Early morning on Saturday, the victim was seen arguing with the suspect along the Roxas Boulevard service road in front of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas building. The man, apparently enraged, got into the car, rammed the victim, and got off again to stab her repeatedly, before running over her and driving away.