Rescuers from Talisay City retrieve the body of the murdered girl, who was found in a cave in Barangay Maghaway, Talisay City on January 9, 2022. | Mayor Samsam Gullas FB page
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Talisay City is offering a P100,000 reward for those, who can help them find the culprits behind murder of a 10-year-old girl whose body was found in a cave in Sitio Napo in Barangay Tapul on Sunday, January 9, 2022.
Police Lieutenant Colonel Randy Caballes, chief of the Talisay City Police Station, said that Mayor Gerald Anthony Gullas relayed to him the reward offer early on Monday morning, January 10, 2022.
Earlier, Gullas also ordered the city police to conduct a ‘massive manhunt operation’ against those behind the alleged abduction and the murder of the victim.
The 10-year-old girl from Barangay Maghaway, who went missing for three days, was found in a state of decomposition in a cave located in Sitio Napo, Barangay Tapul in Talisay City on Sunday, January 9, 2022.
Caballes said that the family went to their station on January 6 to inform them that the victim was nowhere to be found after she excused herself on Wednesday, January 5, from her brother and cousin while taking a dip at the river in their area. However, when the two went back to the mother, the girl was still not there.
READ: Missing girl, 10, found dead in cave in Talisay
On their latest investigation, Caballes said that they would continue to gather information from possible eyewitnesses.
He said that they were looking for four men believed to be possible suspects in the crime.
“[Received information regarding this] sa mga tawo didto . Daghan na sya [river] og manligoay kay boundary mana siya sa nga barangay sa Maghaway ug Tapul sa Talisay ug Pitogo ug Lipata sa Minglanilla. Ang mga tawo, daghan ang mangaligo ana nga sapa nga murag naay falls2 gamay,” Caballes said.
([I received information regarding this] from the people there. There are a lot of people who swim in the river because this area is the boundary of barangays Maghaway and Tapul in Talisay and Pitogo and Lipata in Minglanilla. Many people would swim in the river which is similar as a small waterfall.)
“Even ang igsuon nga laki sa victim nakakita atong upat ka laki, but di lang nya mahinumduman ang nawong, maong wa gyud tay identity anang upat,” he added.
(Even the brother of the victim, saw the four men, but he could not remember their faces, so we don’t have the identity of the four.)
With this, police appealed to the public should they also have knowledge on this to coordinate with them as they continued their investigation. On reports if the girl was raped, Caballes said that they could not tell yet since they were still waiting for the autopsy result because the body of the victim was set to be examined today, January 10.
He further said that when the body was found, the victim was still wearing her clothes.
Caballes said that the parents of the child did not release their statement yet over the alleged rape of their child, and they respected that.
He also said that they still did not know yet if the victim had bruises or gunshot wounds that might have caused her death because they had yet to receive the autosy results of the victim.
He also said that was a possibility that the victim was already dead for around three days since she was reported missing last January 6.
However, this is still subject for verification.
Caballes added that the body, when found, was already in the state of decomposition.
In a separate FB post, Caballes said that they had formed a Technical Working Group (TWG) who would work into the circumstance of this incident.
Caballes also assured the family of the victim that they would work hard to identify the possible suspects to ensure that justice for the girl would be served.
/dbs