THE police still considers former rebel leader Richard “Jake” Rosales a suspect in at least three murder cases in Dumaguete City even though the man is already dead.

Dumaguete police chief Leopoldo Cabanag said the police have gathered enough information and evidence that would indicate Rosales’ alleged involvement in illegal activities, particularly as a gun-for-hire.

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Cabanag said this in the wake of a report that quoted the Revolutionary Proletariat Army-Alex Boncayao Brigade (RPA-ABB) in Negros Oriental as saying it is hoping Rosales will not be used as a “scapegoat” in the many unsolved killings in Dumaguete.

Rosales, who was shot dead in broad daylight last April 29 in Dumaguete, was the RPA-ABB’s commanding officer in Negros Oriental until his separation from the group in 2005.

According to Cabanag, he had identified Rosales during previous interviews as a prime suspect in the gun-slays of Dr. Ami Madamba, Kent Lariosa and Prem Bernadez, as all three were shot with a .45 caliber handgun.

Lariosa also sustained bullet wounds from 9mm rounds, Cabanag added.

At the time of his death, police recovered from Rosales a Colt .45 caliber handgun with several rounds of ammunition that were sent for ballistics tests at the police crime laboratory in Cebu.

Cabanag said he has also requested for a cross-matching of shell casings and slugs recovered from the Madamba, Lariosa and Bernardez crime scenes and those from Rosales’ gun.

The police chief also disclosed that they have uncovered vital information from the inbox and sent messages folders of Rosales’ cellular phone that “indicated he was casing a probable target on the day that he was killed”.

Cabanag said intelligence reports showed that prior to Rosales’ murder, the man and two other companions were believed to be tailing a target within the city proper but the presence of policemen in the busiest section of the city prevented them from making a hit.

The police are now trying to determine Rosales’ two other companions, one from Dumaguete and the other from another area outside of the city, he added.

Cabanag assured the RPA-ABB that the police will put the blame on Rosales for the unsolved murders in the city as there is still no clear evidence linking him to these.

Besides, the other shooting incidents in the past year or so involved the use of a 9mm gun and not a .45 caliber that Rosales had carried.

However, Cabanag also said the police are digging deeper into the death of Rosales as there are a number of possible motives for the hit.

These include a personal grudge, an internal conflict with his other “gun-for-hire” colleagues, a person that he might have crossed, and even the possibility of the New People’s Army taking him down through fresh recruits of the group’s liquidation squad, the Special Partisan Armed Regional Unit or Sparu, Cabanag added. (PNA/Sunnex)