THE two suspects responsible for the robbery inside a public utility jeep (PUJ) that victimized an elderly woman on Tuesday faced robbery and illegal possession of firearm charges before the Cebu City Prosecutor’s Office yesterday.
Nestor Benavente and Arman de la Peña, both of Ozamis City in Misamis Occidental, were charged even as they remained on hospital arrest recuperating from gunshot wounds inflicted by responding off-duty policeman P03 Julius Regis, said SPO3 Felomino Mendaros, investigator of the City Intelligence Branch (CIB) of the Cebu City Police Office (CCPO).
Regis, who was heading home on Tuesday noon when he witnessed the PUJ robbery along Archbishop Reyes Avenue, received a P20, 000 cash reward from Cebu City Mayor-elect Tomas Osmeña yestereday.
Chief Supt. Patrocinio Comendador, regional director of the Police Regional Office Central Visayas (PRO-7), said the two suspects were confirmed to be members of a big-time robbery syndicate based in Mindanao.
“We have received reports prior to the elections that there were armed robbery groups hired as goons. It could be that after the elections, they have done other things to earn money, said Comendador.
Aside from reports that they were hired as political goons, the suspects were also linked to the armed group involved in stealing some P10 million worth of jewelry robbed from a store in a mall in Carcar City last month.
Regis, meanwhile, said he was preparing the documents for the filing of complaints against the two suspects yesterday when he was called to the house of Osmeña, not knowing that he was going to receive the cash reward that day.
When asked what he planned to do with the money, Regis said he would like to share some of it with his colleagues and save the rest for the tuition of his six-year-old daughter who will start school next year.