Thursday, April 19, 2007 Nesmar didn’t kill ma: Mac-Mac By Nicolas C. Delfin
EB MAGALONA – Can a son brutally kill his own mother?
If a 13-year-old kid is to be asked, the answer is most likely a no.
The same is true with Neden Mark Laurente whose mentally disturbed mother, Marietta, was reportedly killed by his older brother, Nesmar, inside their nipa house at about 8 a.m. in Hacienda Diamante, Barangay Damgo in E.B. Magalona town last April 7.
It was Saturday morning last week when 13-year-old “Mac-mac” saw Nesmar bathed in his own blood while hugging their dead mother.
The night before the incident, Mac-mac slept at his uncle’s house about 500 meters away from their house in Hacienda Cudangdang 4.
“I was in a hurry to be back home and meet my brother but my knees suddenly shivered when I saw my mother’s hairs forcefully cut and drenched in blood near the front door,” Mac-mac said in dialect.
“The doors were tied to a side post and I can’t get in. All I heard outside was a strange and soft coarse sounding voice. When I peeped through the open window near our kitchen, I saw my brother reaching out for my help, his blood oozing from his neck while hugging our dead mother,” he added.
As of press time, no witness has surfaced to testify on the incident.
Mac-mac’s father, Nestor Laurente Sr. was away from his family for almost a week to work in a sugarcane plantation in Victorias City.
According to case investigator Police Officer 1 Nestor Batayan, Nesmar killed his mother by hacking her in the different parts of her body with the use of a cane cutter (espading).
Shortly after killing her mother, he (Nesmar) committed suicide by slashing his neck. He was rushed to the Teresita Lopez Jalandoni Memorial Provincial Hospital in Silay City but was pronounced dead, Batayan said.
Premonition
Members of the Laurente family never thought that something horrible would happen to both Marietta and Nesmar.
Jomar Andrada, son of Marietta by her first husband, however, told Sun.Star Bacolod that he experienced a strange feelings prior to the incident.
Andrada, 27, who is working in Manila for three years now, returned home last Sunday.
He said that last April 6, he was holding a kitchen knife while preparing vegetables and fish for dinner, he accidentally cut a wound in his right thumb.
“Something mysterious kept on bothering my mind, I couldn’t sleep that night and the thoughts of them (Marietta and Nesmar) won’t leave as though something bad will happen. Its not that my thumb hurts, its just that I really had a bad feeling that something tragic will happen which I cannot understand,” he said.
A day after, Jomar was stunned by the news brought by a relative that his brother and mother are both dead.
Menopause
According to Jomar, their mother’s illness was due to menopause as diagnosed by their medical doctor.
“Several times, when I was here, I brought her to a doctor. I gave her money for her medicines, mostly vitamins, but she usually had tantrums when we force her to take them. Later, we decided to stop the medication,” Jomar said.
“Besides the doctor told us that her illness is curable and that she will be back to normal as time goes by,” he added.
Also Jomar revealed that one factor that could have triggered their mother’s mental disturbance was when the latter repeatedly recalled and cannot get over her emotional sufferings caused by a miscarriage back in 2003.
Foul play
Aside from Mac-mac who find it impossible for his brother to kill their mother, Nestor also found it extremely perplexing for his son to kill his 48-year-old wife.
“He was a good son and I find no reason for him to brutally kill her mother like a pig. There must have been someone else who did that for him,” he said.
“If I was there, I know this wouldn’t happen to them. But I guess I have to accept the fact that they are now lying in the coffins,” he added.
Results of an autopsy conducted by E.B. Magalona Health Officer Dr. Edwin Jaime on the body of Marietta, showed that she suffered a dozen fatal hack wounds in various parts of the body.
“Both the ulna and the radius on the left arm of the victim was cut and the arms were almost separated due to the strong blow of a sharp and bladed weapon,” Jaime said.
Nestor, however, said it was impossible for an espading to cut through the bones and even damaged the skull.
“Cane cutter’s (espading) blades are not that tensile, they fold when used to cut sugarcane stalks. A sharp bolo would likely leave a perfect slash like what we had seen,” he added.
Asked if he is willing for the case to be reinvestigated, he said, “I am willing and hope we can gather more solid facts to validate what we are thinking and erase suspicions.”
Nestor said he had some misunderstandings with several neighbors because of his wife’s mental state.
He though refused to identify them. “They were irked by my wife’s ranting against them but I had asked them to understand her mental condition,” Nestor said.
He added that prior to the incident one of the said neighbors was drunk that Friday night and told one of his relatives that he was irked with Marietta.
“That same person was seen passing near our house at about 6 of Saturday morning. When we asked him where he was during the incident, he told us that he attended a wake and slept in Barangay San Jose. We later found out and he was very suspicious after we learned that the wake was actually in Barangay Theresa,” Nestor said.
Also he narrated that he was once cooking breakfast in their house when that person passed by, called his wife “buang” (crazy) and even challenged him to a fight.
Aside from this, the Laurente family also alleged that one of the workers in the hacienda was last seen fetching water at the well beside the house of the victims.
“Before I left last March 31, I was puzzled when Nesmar asked me about that guy,” Nestor said.
Meanwhile, E.B. Magalona Police Station Chief Santiago Rapiz said the case was already closed but will conduct a re-investigation if the family wishes to.
“We are always open to have the case re-investigated as long as we find substantial evidences leading to investigate the alleged suspects. We can’t just proceed with the investigation unless there are proofs,” Rapiz said.
He, however, said there was no foul play involved.
“We see no foul play base on the facts we have gathered unless the victims themselves have enemies,” he said.
“The fact that the mother has a mental disorder and the son was also suffering from a nervous breakdown, there was a tendency that the son himself did it to his mother. And for what we saw, he (Nesmar) committed suicide probably after he was already conscious,” he said.
Based on a police report, Nesmar was seen by his neighbors running swiftly back and forth about 500 meters away from their house to the nearby school prior to the discovery of their bodies.
