Samar lawmaker’s driver, found unconscious in locked car, dies

Samar Rep. Edgar Sarmiento looks worried while medics try to revive his driver Robert Dela Cruz, 40, who was found unconscious in a locked car after session adjourned Wednesday night. Sarmiento believes his driver was suffocated while sleeping inside the vehicle. PHOTO/ Marc Jayson Cayabyab, INQUIRER.net

THE driver of Samar Rep. Edgar Sarmiento passed away Wednesday night hours after he was found unconscious inside a locked car at  the parking lot of the House of Representatives.

“He’s dead. He passed away,” Sarmiento told INQUIRER.net over the phone at 9:30 p.m., his voice breaking.

The driver, Robert Dela Cruz, 40, was pulled out of the vehicle before 7 p.m. at the parking lot in front of the South Wing Annex building in the Batasan complex.

Medics tried to revive Dela Cruz who was unresponsive until he was brought into an ambulance past 7 p.m.

Rep. Sarmiento, the younger brother of former Samar Rep. and former Interior Secretary Mel Senen Sarmiento, arrived at the scene looking worried as medics tried to revive Dela Cruz.

When Dela Cruz was carried into the ambulance, the congressman went inside and tried to revive Dela Cruz by pumping the latter’s chest.

A distraught Sarmiento told reporters that he had been calling up his driver after session adjourned at 6:30 p.m. but Dela Cruz was not answering.

It was only after he sent his staff to look for Dela Cruz when the latter was found unconscious in the vehicle.

He said the window of his car had to be broken to open its door and pull out the unconscious Dela Cruz.

Sarmiento said he suspected his driver was suffocated inside the vehicle while sleeping with the airconditioning unit turned on.

Reporters looked at the exhaust pipe and noted that the 2009 Mercedes Benz was parked so close to the parking curb that the exhaust pipe was blocked at the raised lawn platform.

“He’s been with me for quite some time. Seven years. He’s like a brother to me,” Sarmiento said.

He said his driver has a habit of sleeping in the car with the doors locked and the airconditioning unit running.

In a phone interview at 9:30 p.m., Sarmiento broke the news that his driver passed away at the East Avenue Medical Center around 8 p.m.

His voice cracking, Sarmiento said he would be willing to shell out of his own money to help the family of his driver whom he trusted for seven years.

“When you trust someone, I have to get something from my own pocket… I have to do the best I can for someone I trust,” Sarmiento said.