Saturday, September 15, 2007 3 colleagues asleep during prison break
THREE policemen at the Carcar Police Station were “asleep” when two inmates escaped from the detention cell last week, according to the station’s officer-in-charge.
SPO3 Jonas Pananga-nan submitted to Cebu Provincial Police Office Director Carmelo Valmoria his investigation report on the escape, but Valmoria decided to forward this to the Provincial Investigation and Detection Management Branch (PIDMB) for further study.
Pananganan’s report included the written explanation of SPO1 Norman Lapeña, who claimed he was the designated jailer that time.
Lapeña said he received a phone call from the San Fernando Police Station, informing him of a hit and run in Minglanilla town.
Request
SPO2 Victor Cueno of the San Fernando Police Station asked him to intercept the vehicle responsible by conducting a road block.
Lapeña said he tried to ask SPO1s Joel Pana-nganan, Reno Abellanosa and Socrates Familgan to proceed to the main road to heed the request of the SPO2 Cueno.
However, the three were reportedly asleep. He said he tried to wake them up but they did not, leaving him no choice but to go to the highway on his own to conduct the roadblock.
While he was standing along the road on the lookout for the described vehicle, some of his colleagues who came from a shooting alarm in Barangay Ocaña saw him.
They asked what he was doing alone and told him to return to the station while they continued with the road block.
Missing details
PIDMB Chief Teofilo Siclot told reporters that Pananganan’s report lacked details, as it did not explain the role of all police personnel on duty at the time.
Siclot wants to get a complete list of all officers on duty during the escape and what they were doing.
He also wants a copy of their daily location of personnel, their tour of duty and attendance sheet.
Also, he will get a statement from one of the witnesses who saw the escape.
A certain Desiderio Abacena was in the detention cell for drunkenness and was placed there until he will be sober.
He told the police that at about 2:30 a.m., he heard inmates Arvin Perdigan Nacua, 24, and Dionisio Cerenio Bedina, 30, yelling “Sir!”
When no one responded, they picked the lock to the detention cell and slipped unnoticed.
Since he was to be released in the morning, Abacena also left the cell and went home. (MEA)
