Lapu-Lapu official orders check on city’s jail facility

YCONG

Acting Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Marcial Ycong has ordered a check on Danao City police intelligence reports that illegal drugs were flowing out of the Lapu-Lapu City Jail and sold by drug dealers in the northern city.

The order came days after a shootout ensued between Danao City policemen and suspected drug dealers in Barangay Guinsay, Danao City, Tuesday dawn, which resulted in the death of three drug suspects.

Danao City police chief Senior Insp. Alejandro Batobalonos informed the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP), which manages the Lapu-Lapu City Jail, of intelligence reports linking one of their detainees to the illegal drug supplies that found its way into Danao.

“We just informed BJMP about our intel report. But we are willing to coordinate with them if they want reports from us,” Batobalonos said.

Drug suspect Julius Gacita and his two companions — Dexter Giango and Edwin Oriendo — were killed after sustaining multiple gunshot wounds on the different parts of their body during a shootout with Batobalonos’ men in a buy-bust operation following a month of surveillance.

Gacita reportedly sourced his shabu (methamphetamine) supply from Jesus Tabla, a detainee of the Lapu-Lapu City Jail.

Ycong asked Lapu-Lapu City police director Supt. Rommel Cabagnot to double-check with jail authorities in order to get to the bottom of the Danao intelligence reports.

The acting mayor was, however, confident that an earlier report by Cabagnot — that apart from jail visitors trying to sneak in illegal drugs into the facility, there were no illegal drug operations inside the city jail — still holds true.

Lapu-Lapu City jail warden Supt. Gil Inopia, for his part, said that nine mobile phones confiscated during a greyhound operation, September last year, had been submitted for forensic examination to determine if they were used to conduct illegal drug transactions.

Results of the forensic examination on the phones had yet to be released, six months after the units were confiscated inside the jail.

Inopia also requested for more CCTV and replacements for the jail’s short-ranged signal jammers to better monitor the inmates.