Milk tea deaths: Abrigo family hits MPD over filing raps vs son

THE family of the owner of the milk tea shop decried the filing of criminal charges, including murder, against the son of William Abrigo who died after drinking a contaminated milk tea.

Insisting that Lloyd Abrigo had no hand in the deaths, the Abrigo family said in a statement on Monday that they were “shocked” by the cases the Manila Police District filed against the younger Abrigo for the death of his father, and ErgoCha milk tea house customer Suzaine Dagohoy.

READ: Milk tea deaths: Shop owner hits raps vs son; MPD cites ‘oxalic acid’

“The Abrigo family would like to emphasize that their family fully cooperated with the authorities and even brought a witness that could have helped them with the case. Regretfully, this was ignored,” they said.

The 23-year-old Lloyd is also facing frustrated murder charges for the case of Arnold Aydalla, Dagohoy’s boyfriend, who also tasted the milk tea but survived after being treated in hospital.

“Their family is a victim too, and so they are just as anxious to get to the bottom of this and is in fact gathering evidence against the person responsible,” the legal counsel of Abrigos said in a text message to the media.

“Mrs. Abrigo’s son is innocent and the family is confident that justice will be served and the truth will come out,” Lawyer Hazel Naredo-Ruiz said.

William and Dagohoy died when they drank the “Hokkaido”-flavored milk tea William himself prepared. The Philippine National Police earlier affirmed the MPD’s findings that the milk tea contained “oxalic acid,” a substance commonly used as bleaching agent.

William’s wife Adela is the registered owner of ErgoCha milk teashop in Sampaloc which had been shut down since the April 9 incident.

Closed circuit television footage gathered by MPD investigators showed Lloyd arriving at the shop the night before the incident and preparing a concoction. The shop’s helper Joseph Garnacio said Lloyd brought with him a foul-smelling chemical that night.

A day after the incident, Garnacio said Lloyd went back to the shop and allegedly asked him to wash drinking glasses and other utensils.

The family’s lawyer Benedicto Buenaventura earlier maintained that Lloyd did not put any chemical in the milk tea solution.