Police keep probing kidnap-slay case

Thursday, February 17, 2011

CEBU CITY -- Minglanilla's police will keep investigating the abduction and murder of Ellah Joy Pique, a six-year-old town resident who was lured into a vehicle by a Caucasian man and a Filipina companion.

As this developed, hotel managers confirmed Wednesday that Sven Erik Berger and a woman checked into the Waterfront Hotel in Lahug, Cebu City at 4:51 p.m. last February 8.

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That was less than an hour after Ellah Joy, according to witnesses, was last seen outside her school in Minglanilla, some 15 kilometers away from Cebu City.

Police insisted they have a strong case against Berger and his fiancée, Cebuana nurse Karen Esdrelon. They were arrested last Saturday night, before they could board a 10:15 p.m. flight to Hong Kong.

Cebu Provincial Police Office Director Erson Digal said he believes the inquiry by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI)-Central Visayas will not have any bearing on the complaint his office filed against the couple.

Positive

“We cannot ignore the positive identification of the witnesses,” he said, referring to three children who saw the couple who picked up Ellah Joy outside her school last February 8.

But even if the kidnapping with homicide complaint has been filed at the prosecutor’s office, Minglanilla Police Chief Laurel Almirante said the town’s police force will continue to investigate, as ordered by the town council.

Reynante Pique, in a separate interview Wednesday, assailed doubts raised over the arrest of Berger and Esdrelon. To prove the credibility of his witnesses, he is willing to allow them to undergo a lie detector test, if necessary.

With the suspects in jail, Reynante and his wife, Ligaya are preparing for their daughter’s burial in this Sunday.

Vice Mayor Elanito Peña and Councilor Concordio Mejias visited the Pique family’s house past 11 a.m. Wednesday and handed P100,000 cash to the slain girl’s mother, Ligaya.

She thanked them for the financial help.

In her news conference Wednesday, Governor Gwendolyn Garcia said the abduction and the murder “was a gruesome and a most heinous crime.”

She confirmed that the NBI, as a member of the provincial task force against crime, is conducting its own inquiry on the case.

Identification

In a letter to Provincial Attorney Marino Martinquilla, hotel manager Marco Protacio and hotel safety manager Jonathan Ho told the Provincial Task Force Against Criminality that Berger was accompanied by a woman when he checked in at 4:51 p.m last February 8. He checked out the following day at 11 a.m.

“We are only able to establish the identity of the male guest, as it was his name that was officially registered in the reservation,” the letter said said.

There was nothing suspicious about the guest’s stay in the hotel.

The hotel managers also said the linens the police showed them were different from the ones the hotel uses. Policemen visited the hotel last February 14 and showed hotel personnel the linens that wrapped the child’s body, when it was found last February 9.

Governor Garcia, meanwhile, intends to meet with the Local School Board to find out what measures have been taken to keep school children safe.

She supports the move of the Provincial Board to ask for at least two tanods in each school in the province, and said the Capitol has been assisting them with their honorarium and their enrollment in a group accident insurance policy.

For his part, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama said he would prefer to create a task force rather than offer a cash reward for the arrest of the suspects.

Prosecution

Rama said offering a reward would only encourage people to pose as witnesses. He added, though, that he will not stop the giving of rewards since this has become part of the system.

He said the task force should consist of different law enforcement agencies who will work separately but collaborate on gathering information.

In his news conference, Rama also commended the Cebu City Police Office for reducing the crime rate last month, compared to the same period in the previous years, without necessarily giving out rewards for all the cases solved.

“Why is it that in Cebu City, now under (Senior Superintendent) Buenafe, we don’t practice cash rewards in every arrest?” said Rama.

In Wednesday's Talakayan sa Isyung Pulis forum, Digal and Regional Investigation and Detective Management Division Chief Patrocinio Comendador both said it is now up to the prosecutor to decide on the complaint.

The two police officials said the seven-day waiver of detention signed by Esdrelon and Berger will give the police enough time to gather more evidence.

Time out

During their regular session last Tuesday, the Minglanilla Council decided to withhold the P100,000 reward for the capture of the suspects.

“We have reached a consensus not to release yet the cash reward, until it is clear that the real perpetrators are brought to justice,” Councilor Mejias said.

He said his colleagues in the council have also expressed doubts on whether the two suspects arrested at the Mactan Cebu International Airport last Saturday are indeed the culprits.

“It’s better to wait for further development because we cannot take the reward back if we release it,” Mejias added.

Also on Wednesday, the head of the NBI in Central Visayas clarified reports they are intervening in the police’s investigation.

Regional Director Eduard Villarta, in an interview, said the agency will wait for the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor to finish its inquest investigation on the kidnapping with homicide complaint the Cebu Provincial Police Office filed.

Wait and see

“They (the police) have already filed a complaint. In cases like that, it is prudent to wait and see,” he said.

He admitted, though, that they conducted a fact-finding investigation on the killing, particularly the alibi that the respondents raised.

This was not their parallel investigation, but that of the Provincial Anti Crime Task Force, he explained.

He clarified that no official findings have been reached or released.

“The report is still being drafted,” he said.

The complaint the police filed rests on the testimony of three children who said they saw a couple get Ellah Joy to board their vehicle last February 8. They later identified the couple as Berger and Esdrelon.

Lawyer Kit Enriquez, a member of the Provincial Task for on Anti-Criminality and a director of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) Cebu City Chapter, believes that the police’s case against the respondents is strong.

“The identification was very clear, down to earth,” said Enriquez. “And in their hearts, they know that these are the people who took away their schoolmate.”

But another IBP director, lawyer Dave Duallo, described the case as “on perilous ground, if no other evidence supports it.”