Thursday, June 28, 2007 More radios for beat police after attack on Korean, friend
POLICE operatives tasked to investigate the shooting of a Korean and his Filipina friend are now pursuing the alleged perpetrators, Acting Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) Director Patrocinio Comendador said.
Comendador told reporters yesterday that the Homicide Section and the Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Bureau have gathered leads on the “clear identities” of those involved in the attack.
He was also grateful for the cooperation of leaders of the Korean community in Cebu who provided policemen with vital information.
Of two possible motives the police are pursuing, Comendador said the information they have gathered points to a love triangle as the most likely reason behind the shooting.
A business-related angle was earlier looked into but this has been ruled out.
Taecheol Park, 41, a widower, of Busan, South Korea and temporarily staying at Crown Garden Hotel in Salinas Drive, Lahug; and Bona Binetes, 24, of Corazon Village II, Talisay City survived an attack by two motorcycle-riding men, one of them armed with a caliber .45 pistol.
They were shot last last Monday night at the corner of F. Cabahug and Tres Borces Sts., Barangay Mabolo, Cebu City.
Park was wounded in the hand and right side of his body while Binetes was injured in the right side of her body.
Homicide Section Chief Mario Monilar, in a separate interview, said he spoke yesterday with Charlie Shin, general manager of the United Kingdom Community Association in Cebu, on the incident.
Shin assured him of the Korean community’s “all-out cooperation” to help solve the attack.
Meanwhile, Comenda-dor said he plans to realign the distribution of handheld radios to the beat patrol policemen, following the shooting of Park and his friend.
During Monday’s incident, there were two rookie policemen on their field training program who were deployed near the crime scene but failed to pursue the suspects, because they didn’t have a vehicle.
They also didn’t have a handheld radio they could have used to inform the Mobile Patrol Group (MPG) and had to run to a nearby store that has a landline to call for back up.
Comendador said he will prioritize the distribution of handheld radios to beat patrol policemen for easier coordination. (JST)
