If you’re innocent, stay in Cebu, police asks duo

Thursday, March 17, 2011

A TASK Force Ellah Joy official yesterday urged a Cebuana and her British boyfriend to stay in Cebu until the police file charges against suspects in the abduction and murder of a 6-year-old girl.

He hinted that would be one way for Bella Ruby Santos and Ian Charles Griffiths to prove their innocence “beyond mere statements.”

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Senior Supt. Patrocinio Comendador Jr., the task force’s spokesperson, continued to hide the names of their target personalities, despite Santos’s appearance in court last Tuesday. Comendador was recently designated as acting director of the Cebu Provincial Police Office.

“We have checked and counter-checked the evidence. All angles have been looked into.

We will prove that the suspects were there at the time of the incident…We are conducting our investigation based on evidence and not on our perceptions,” Comendador said.

About 50 residents from Inayagan, City of Naga attended last Tuesday’s hearing, where Santos and her lawyer asked the court to quash the warrant the police used in searching Santos’s SUV and house.

Comendador said that baffled him.

“Why (are you) making defenses out of nothing? We have not announced any suspects or filed charges against anyone. Do not sway the public by gathering people around you,” he said.

Santos surfaced Tuesday to attend the hearing.

She also denied any hand in the abduction and murder of six-year-old Ellah Joy Pique, whose body was found dumped at a foot of a cliff in Barili town last Feb. 9.

Without naming the suspects, Comendador said the task force is just waiting for the results of the laboratory analysis before they file the case.

“The battleground is the court. Let the court scrutinize our evidence,” he said.

But while Comendador refused to say whether Santos and Griffiths are, in fact, officially considered suspects, the lawyer of Renante Pique said he plans to file criminal complaints this week against the couple.

Lawyer Daryll Roque Amante said in a phone interview that Santos’s story—that she and Griffiths stayed at their home in Naga last Feb. 8, the day Pique was kidnapped in Minglanilla town—was a “weak alibi and mere denial.”

That defense should be examined in a court trial, he said.

But Santos’s lawyer, Anna Luz Cristal, warned Amante to be more cautious. “I believe in my heart that my client did not do anything wrong,” she said in a separate interview.

“Magdahan-dahan siya baka siya ang mabalikan niyan (He’d better be cautious, otherwise he might suffer consequences.”

Atty. Cristal said they will file administrative cases against the police for the

manner in which they conducted the raid last March 4.

The police seized a blue Mitsubishi Pajero (LMJ-382).

In an interview, Atty. Amante said that this time, they are “90 percent sure” about the culprits and have at least 10 witnesses.

Cristal said that while they sympathize with the victim’s family, it is inappropriate to point fingers at her client.

“We all want the truth to come out here. We want an extensive investigation on the case because we all want this to be solved,” said Cristal.