LESS than a day after police raided the house of alleged Cebuano drug lord Rowen Secretaria on Banacon Island, Getafe, Bohol, the bodies of a couple were found inside the cemetery on the island, riddled with gunshot wounds.
The proximity of the two incidents led investigators to suspect that these could be related. Police identified the victims as Christopher Hermosara Dejacto, 39, and his wife Ma. Theresa Cañete Dejacto, both residents of Barangay Ermita in Cebu City, where Secretaria resided. “
The wounds seemed like they were shot from the back, but we could not confirm yet,” said PO3 Roel Lagura, assistant police investigator of the Getafe Police Station.
He said the police station was informed after a concerned citizen discovered the bodies at around 4:20 p.m. yesterday. The couple’s child, CJ Christopher, a Grade 8 student, told police that he saw his parents at 2 p.m.
“Ingon niya mamista ra daw na sila sa iyang mama aron pod mobisita sa papa niya nga nagtrabaho kunu ni Secretaria (He said that they were in the area with his mother to attend the fiesta celebration and to visit his father who works for Secretaria),” Lagura told CDN.
Lagura said that Dejacto worked as carpenter for Secretaria.
The Dejacto couple lived on Banacon Island for almost two months. They brought their four children to the island.
Police recovered three empty shells of .45 caliber pistol and five empty shells of still not yet known caliber firearm.
“The motive is still not yet known. The investigation is ongoing,” said Lagura.
He said they were looking into two possible motives.
One is that the victims might have been killed by relatives of Secretaria on the suspicion that they were the ones who ratted his whereabouts to the police.
The killing could also be motivated by personal grudge against the couple, police said.