CDN FRESHTALK/OCT 31,2018: Police Regional Director Debold Sinas talks about their security preparations for the celebration of the All Saints’ and All Souls’ Days during the CDNFreshtalks at the CDN newsroom. (CDN PHOTO/TONEE DESPOJO)
The top official of the Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) believed there are policemen who served as hitmen of drug personalities in the region, particularly in Cebu.
In an interview over Cebu Daily News’s Facebook Live program Freshtalks on Wednesday, PRO-7 director Chief Supt. Debold Sinas said there are retired or active police officers who are behind these killings in Cebu, especially the killing of people allegedly
involved in illegal drugs.
He explained that in every drug group, the drug lord has three kinds of people under him: the distributors, the collectors, and the hitmen.
He said that drug personalities, especially big time drug pushers, have hitmen in their group.
“Kinsa man ni sila (hitmen)? Most likely retired nga army o mga pulis. Or naa pa gani aktibo wala lang ta kahibalo,” said Sinas.
(Who are these hitmen? Most likely these are retired military or police officers. Or there are active police officers we just don’t know)
He said drug personalities hired retired military or police officer because of their expertise.
“Kung dismissed or retired ang usa ka pulis unsay expertise? Firearms and security. So naa siyay dala-dala nga expertise mao ni gipangita sa ilaha (by the drug groups),” said Sinas.
(What is the expertise of a dismissed or retired police officer? Firearms and security. So this person who has these kind of skills is what is needed by the drug groups)
Monitoring
He claimed that these police officers, who are hitmen of drug personalities, are the scalawags in uniform.
“Ako mo angkon ko nga siguro naay mga active police (who are into these killings) nga wala mi kaila,” said Sinas.
(I’ll admit that I think there are active police officers who are into these killings that we do not know of)
Particularly suspicious, he said, are police officers who were once assigned in Central Visayas and were transferred to other regions but would keep on
coming back to Cebu.
After President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office, a number of police officers in Central Visayas were transferred mainly to Mindanao because of suspicions over their alleged involvement in the illegal drug trade.
“Daghang gipangpalayas dinhi (Cebu) nga mga pulis nga namalik. So most likely sila ni. Mao ni among gipangbantayan og si kinsa ni namalik,” added Sinas.
(Many police officers who were sent away keep on coming back to Cebu. So most likely these police officers are the hitmen of drug personalities. We are closely monitoring those who have returned)
He said that they are conducting an investigation into the background of these individuals.
The Regional Intelligence Division (RID) already has the dossiers on these police officers so they are just going to monitor their activities, said Sinas.
Sinas admitted that, hitmen and the “collectors” of these drug personalities are the most hard to find.
“Wala mani silay dala-dala nga shabu. Lisod gyud. Pinaka lisod ning mga collector,” said Sinas.(They do not carry around the illegal drugs with them. That is why it is very difficult. The collectors are very hard to find.)
The collectors, he said, are the ones who collect the proceeds of the drug sales of the distributors. The distributors, who often are the ones who get arrested, are caught with drugs but hardly with any cash since they don’t get to keep the money.
According to Sinas, in the instances when the distributors would fail to transmit the drug sales to collectors, that would be when the hitmen would be called in to get the erring distributor.
Sinas believed this was happened to the five men who were found dead in Barangay Malubog, Cebu City on October 4, insisting that it was likely a result of a soured drug transaction and had nothing to do with the police, as claimed by some sectors.
The reason
But the practice of some policemen moonlighting as hitmen is also the reason why the police in the region are being linked to drug-related killings, said Sinas.
He added that since they believed that there are active police officers who are into this business, it is what the public see and blame the Philippine National Police as an institution for these killings.
Sinas said that honest policemen only kill when they are provoked by suspects or when their lives are in danger, adding it would also be illogical for the police to go through the tedious process of applying for search warrants in court when they could just take shortcuts and simply kill suspects.
“Kun puwede diay mi mo shortcut dili na lang diay mi mag lisod-lisod ug apply aning search warrant,” said Sinas.
(If we could then just take the shortcuts and resort to killing drug personalities, we should no longer have to go through the difficult process of applying for a search warrant)
Sinas challenged those people who think the police are behind the killings in Cebu to prove their claim. “Show us the evidence. Kami wala gyud mi ana (killings). Kun mamugos sila nga kami, amo na lang na ipasa Diyos,” said Sinas.
(Show us the evidence. We are not into killing suspects. If they will force the issue, we will lift it all up to the Lord)
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña is one of the people who openly blamed the police, especially Sinas and Cebu City Police Office director Senior Supt.
Royina Garma, for the spate of killings in Cebu, particularly those who have been linked to the illegal drug trade.