Tentorio case: 2 tagged ‘brains’ not charged

COTABATO CITY—A colleague of murdered Italian missionary Fr. Fausto Tentorio questioned the failure of the National Bureau of Investigation to charge a businessman and a former police chief as masterminds in the murder of Tentorio on Oct. 17 last year.

Fr. Pete Geremia, Tentorio’s colleague at the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (Pime), said the confession made by the gunman in the murder that tagged William Buenaflor and former police chief Benjamin Rioflorido as masterminds appeared to have been disregarded in the filing of the charges.

Charged by the NBI at the regional trial court of Kidapawan City were confessed gunman Jimmy Ato, his brother Robert, and brothers Jose Sultan Sampulna and Dima Maligudan Sampulna.

In his confession, Ato tagged Buenaflor and Rioflorido, former police chief of Arakan, North Cotabato, as masterminds in the murder of Tentorio.

Ato said Tentorio was killed because of his opposition to a hydropower plant project in Arakan, which would have benefited some landowners.

Geremia said he believed Ato’s confession was credible. “But until now there has been no development in his revelation,” said Geremia.

Tentorio was leaving his convent in Arakan for a clergy meeting in Kidapawan City when he was assassinated.

He was the third Pime missionary murdered in Mindanao since 1985.

In 1985, a group of militiamen headed by Norberto Manero murdered Fr. Tulio Favali in Tulunan, North Cotabato.

Manero had been convicted of the murder but pardoned by former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Jeoffrey Maitem, Inquirer Mindanao