Man, 72, held for QC cutthroat murder

Thanks to observant neighbors, the police were able to take into custody a suspect in the brutal slay of a woman inside her house in Quezon City just two hours after her body was found in the master bedroom with a slit  throat.

Cenen Urbano, 72, was arrested in his house for the killing of Ma. Salud Gatmaitan and the wounding of the victim’s mother, Noemi Pineda, and their housemaid, according to Quezon City Police District director (QCPD) Senior Supt. Richard Albano.

Two other suspects—Urbano’s son-in-law Von Bernardo and a still unidentified man—remain at large. All three now face murder charges.

The police said they were verifying information that Urbano’s wife is a Gatmaitan and related to the victim’s husband.

They were also checking reports that Gatmaitan’s killing had something to do with her lending business.

This was after they were told that the two men who entered the victim’s house—Bernardo and his unidentified companion—had ransacked it for land titles given as collateral for loans as well as checks supposedly issued by Bernardo’s wife.

Gatmaitan, 59, was killed inside her house on Ipo Street, La Loma, Quezon City, around 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday. Her mother and their housemaid remain confined at a nearby hospital after they were both hit repeatedly with a blunt object.

QCPD deputy director for administration Senior Supt. Joel Pagdilao said that witnesses had told them that earlier, they spotted a Mitsubishi Adventure (WGB 738) stop in front of the victim’s house. Two men got out and were let in by the maid.

The witnesses said that after several minutes, they heard someone screaming “Stop it, Jay!” followed by the two men running out of the house with one of them clutching a sheaf of documents. The two got into the vehicle and drove off.

The police later determined that Jay was Bernardo’s nickname.

Urbano was arrested after the victims’ neighbors managed to take down the license plate of the Mitsubishi Adventure.

A check with the Land Transportation Office then showed that the van was registered in his name, prompting the police to go to his house and place him under custody at 12:30 p.m.

Although Urbano denied any involvement in the killing, claiming that it was always his son-in-law who used the van, two watch-your-car boys positively identified him as the man who alighted from the vehicle at the parking lot of Sto. Domingo Church shortly after the killing.

The van was found abandoned at the church compound, just a few meters away from the victim’s house. It was recovered around 3 p.m. in a police dragnet operation.

The watch-your-car boys told the police that the old man had promised to give them P5 to watch his vehicle. They also positively identified him after they were shown his picture by the police.

What further implicated Urbano, however, was the bloodstained jacket found inside the vehicle.

La Loma police station commander Supt. Osmundo de Guzman told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that according to the information given to them by Gatmaitan’s housemaid, Bernardo had been wearing the jacket on the day she let him inside the house.

Also found inside the vehicle was a memory card for a camera which contained photographs of Bernardo, said QCPD homicide section head Insp. Elmer Monsalve.

As for the motive, National Capital Region Police Office chief Director Leonardo Espina said they had ruled out robbery.

“The suspects were known to the victim. The helper even let them inside the house,” Espina said in a press conference Thursday.