Couple in Pasig drug bust have 14 children

When they were arrested on Wednesday, live-in partners Mario Caballero and Ma. Honey Guevarra had another major problem apart from the criminal charges they face: What happens now to their 14 children?

Make that 15, if they count the child in Guevarra’s womb.

The couple, whom the police described as remnants of a drug trafficking group operating in eastern Metro Manila, were arrested at a Pasig City hotel on the night of Jan. 4.

Chief Insp. Rommel Macatlang, chief of the Eastern Police District–Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, said the suspects were caught selling P300 worth of “shabu” to an undercover agent inside their hotel room on Urbano Velasco Avenue, Barangay Pinagbuhatan.

Also seized from the couple were seven sachets of shabu with an estimated street value of P50,000, a pack of dried marijuana leaves, a digital weighing scale, drug paraphernalia and P2,600 in cash.

According to Macatlang, the 34-year-old Caballero, the operation’s main target, was part of the Rojo drug trafficking group who has found buyers mostly among nightshift workers like taxi drivers, security guards, and market butchers.

Guevarra, 43, is currently two months pregnant with her 15th child—her first with Caballero, the official said. She and Caballero have seven other children each from previous partners.

About two weeks ago, the EPD-CIDG arrested the alleged group leader, Rhoda Rojo, also in Pinagbuhatan on a warrant issued by Judge Achilles Balauitan of Pasig Regional Trial Court–Branch 154.

Five more alleged members have been arrested since May last year and remain in detention. Macatlang identified them as Francisco Amisposo, 53; Editha Virol, 46; Ferdinand Virol; 47; Franklin Virol, 19; and Vergie Villarin, 37.