Sinas to Osmeña: Refrain from accusing the police of wrongdoings

Police Brigadier General Debold Sinas

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Central Visayas police have nothing to do with the death of a colleague, Police Captain Delfin Bontuyan, who was gunned down on Tuesday afternoon while travelling on his way home to Barangay Talamban, Cebu City.

Police Brigadier General Debold Sinas, director of the Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7), said that outgoing Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña should already cease from accusing the police of wrongdoings and posting these on social media.

He said that Osmeña does not even have proof to show that men in uniform were behind Bontuyan’s death.

Read More: Policeman ambushed near Mabolo Police Station

Sinas said that Mabolo police continue to investigate Bontuyan’s death. They are also looking into the dead cop’s background and his previous assignment at the Cordillera and later on the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

They needed to especially verify reports on Bontuyan’s alleged involvement in the illegal drugs trade, the reason why he was relieved as head of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Central Visayas (CIDG-7) in 2016, Sinas said.

Read More:PRO-7: Bontuyan relieved from CIDG due to alleged connection to illegal drug trade 

Sinas said he also wanted to know what Bontuyan, who is now assigned in ARMM, was doing in Cebu. Sinas said that all policemen where barred from leaving their mother units during the election season.

The PRO-7 director does not discount the possibility that Bontuyan’s killing was drug-related.  Sinas said that he will have CIDG-7 coordinate with Bontuyan’s family while they investigate his death.

Read More: Police pursue ‘four men’ in Bontuyan murder

But for Osmeña, Bontuyan was another victim of political persecution.

The dead cop was father of Christine Bontuyan, the Sanguniang Kabataan (SK) president in Barangay Talamban and an ally of the Bando Osmeña Pundok Kauswagan (BOPK).

In a Facebook post shortly after Police Captain Bontuyan was killed on Tuesday afternoon, Osmeña said that Christine documented on her social media page the alleged harassment on BOPK supporters by the police during the May 13 midterm polls.

“His name is Captain Delfin Bontuyan, formerly PNP CIDG (Philippine National Police Crime Investigation and Detection). Yesterday, he was approached by police who asked him what his relationship is to Christine Bontuyan, who was harassed by police during election day,” said Osmeña’s FB post.

Osmeña insinuated that politics could be motive behind Bontuyan’s death and the possibility that policemen were involved in his killing.

But Sinas questioned Osmeña’s basis for making an unfounded accusation.

Sinas said that it was always easy to accuse the police of wrongdoings.

“If we use that logic, concluding without proper premise, then I can easily say that the mayor knows the drug protectors of the City. But that is not the case. The police cannot issue such statement because we have no proper premise,” said Sinas in Cebuano./dcb