QC cop on PDEA mission shot dead

CAMP VICENTE LIM, Laguna—A policeman assigned at the Quezon City Police District (QCPD) died on the spot after suspected drug dealers ambushed a surveillance team of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) in Bacoor City, Cavite, on Monday.

The QCPD, however, said that SPO3 Alejandro Ame had been declared absent without official leave (AWOL) after he failed to report for work at the Novaliches police station last month.

His superior also told the Inquirer that they did not know why he was with the PDEA team at the time he was killed.

Ame, who reportedly also served as an informant for the antidrug agency, was on a surveillance operation with two antinarcotics agents when they were attacked by at least 10 men on Molino Road in Barangay Molino 3 around 4 a.m. Monday.

Supt. Rommel Estolano, Bacoor City police chief, said the footage taken by a closed circuit television camera at a nearby establishment showed Ame inside a car and the PDEA agents in a sport utility vehicle when some men on a motorcycle started shooting at them.

Shots were also seen being fired from another vehicle, a van, which the police believed carried the rest of the suspects, Estolano added in a phone interview.

“(The agents) were able to retaliate and wound one of the gunmen although his companions helped him (escape),” he said.

One of the PDEA agents was slightly wounded but the other remained in critical condition in a hospital.

Estolano said that someone must have leaked details of the antidrug operation.

The Bacoor police were conducting follow-up operations to track the suspects, he added. “We think we are on the right track although we cannot divulge any more details at the moment,” he said.

According to Estolano, they could be dealing with a “big group” of illegal drug dealers which “as you can see, has the capacity to hire (gunmen) and carry out an attack that easily. “That kind of (attack) requires a large sum of money,” he said.

The surveillance operation on Monday morning was organized by the PDEA National Capital Region.

A source who requested anonymity for lack of authority to discuss sensitive details of the operation said that they could be dealing with a big-time Chinese drug syndicate.

Meanwhile, Ame’s superior officer, Supt. Norberto Babagay, Novaliches police station commander, said the slain policeman was assigned to his station from Region II last month.

Ame was given a week to take care of his assignment papers but he failed to comply, resulting in his being declared AWOL.

“We are not aware of his activities and how he ended up in an anti-illegal drugs operation in Cavite,” Babagay said, clarifying that he never saw the policeman at the police station. With Julie M. Aurelio