Lesson learned: MPD makes quick work of hostage taker

IT was over in 30 minutes.

Applying a “lesson” painfully learned five years ago, the Manila police on Thursday shot dead a man who took a woman hostage using a pointed object on a public utility bus on Taft Avenue after brief negotiations produced no results.

Local authorities said the incident was quickly resolved lest the MPD repeat the costly mistakes of the Aug. 23, 2010, Quirino Grandstand hostage crisis, where a 10-hour standoff ended with the hostage taker, a disgruntled police officer, killing eight Hong Kong nationals on a tourist bus before being killed himself. The tragedy strained relations between Manila and Hong Kong for four years.

“We’ve learned our lesson. Because of that experience, our police knew that if there’s an opportunity to save the victim, the life of the victim is what’s important.  As much as possible, you have to save lives,” said Manila Vice Mayor Isko Moreno, who was on-site during the police response.

“We have to congratulate our policemen. In less than an hour, it was solved. The victim is safe and the hostage taker is dead. We have to congratulate our policemen for doing a good job,” said Mayor Joseph Estrada, who arrived when the crisis was over.

Supt. Albert Barot, chief of the MPD’s Station 5 (Ermita), said the first police responders immediately tried talking to the suspect as soon as they arrived. Officers on patrol were already in the high-traffic area when the incident was reported, said Barot.

According to a bus passenger interviewed by the Inquirer, the man boarded the Alabang-bound HM Transport bus at Lawton around 2:20 p.m. and grabbed the woman seated next to him as the bus approached Philippine General Hospital (PGH).

Moreno said responding officers surrounded the bus to look for an opening as the talks continued.

“(Our officers) saw there was a threat on the life of the victim because he was pointing his knife and pressing it harder on her neck. So the responding elements took the final option,” Barot told reporters at the scene.

Witnesses who were on the bus initially said the hostage taker used only a pen as weapon. But PO3  Chris Ocampo, the officer on the case, said he carried both a pen and a “small knife.”

The MPD said policemen fired shots from both sides of the bus, with the kill shot coming through a window near the driver’s seat.

The target was hit at least thrice in the body. He was brought to PGH where he died and remained unidentified at press time.

He was described to be around 30-35 years old and wearing violet basketball shorts and a white T-shirt.

“We acted fast because the threat on the victim’s life was already there. The first responder already talked to the hostage-taker asking him to surrender. But while they were talking, he was pressing his knife harder,” Barot said.

Moreno said the hostage sustained slight injuries on her neck and was also brought to PGH for treatment.

The hostage was later identified as Marielle Salvador, a Graphic Arts student at Technological University of the Philippines.

Maricold Nicolas, another bus passenger, said that before the man took the TUP student hostage, he apparently tried to rob another passenger, a male student, but the latter fought back and got off the bus.

The suspect then started appearing restless as he moved from one seat to another.

It was at this point that he grabbed Salvador, according to Ocampo.

The hostage taker even asked for water and wanted to call his mother during the negotiation, he added.

The bus driver Mario Olivar and his conductor were able get out of the bus. When the suspect became “uncontrollable” and started “hitting” Salvador and pressing his weapon on her neck, a decision was made to shoot, Ocampo said.

The fatal shots came from Senior Insp. Dionel Brannon, chief of the Lawton precinct under MPD-Station 5, he added.