Sunday, October 07, 2007 Man killed outside court had no record
HAVE the so-called vigilantes of Cebu City killed their first “innocent” victim?
Rico Tautho, lawyer of victim 181 Marlon Galinzuga, said his childhood acquaintance and neighbor didn’t have a criminal record because he was never convicted of a crime.
Galinzuga was shot eight times outside the Palace of Justice rear gate, at the corner of Don Gil Garcia and M. Velez Sts., around 4:30 p.m. last Sept. 28.
The place was abuzz with armed policemen and jail guards who, only minutes before, had engagements inside the facility. But nobody pursued the two masked and motorcycle-riding assailants.
Galinzuga’s stint at the Guadalupe PNP Station cell, Tautho said, was because he surrendered to the police a cellular phone that two others had stolen at gunpoint somewhere on Andres Abellana.
The robbery suspects, whom Tautho did not represent and did not identify, issued an affidavit admitting they merely left the unit with Galinzuga to escape pursuit.
All the other “vigilante-style” killings involved people with previous court convictions or pending cases.
“He came to me for advice and I told him to surrender it. He was charged because he was in possession of the evidence but he was cleared after preliminary investigation. In fairness to him, he had no existing case contrary to that newspaper report (not in Sun.Star Cebu),” Tautho said in an interview.
“I feel pity for the daughter. She worked so hard to get her father out of that jail,” he added.
SPO1 Jay Yballe, who led the Homicide Section team that investigated the incident, described the manner of killing as “vigilante-style.”
Galinzuga, 40, bore gunshot wounds to the head, back and arms. He fell face down. Empty cartridge casings were found around him.
He was identified by his 19-year-old daughter, Mardeth.
Like the 180 other shootings that preceded it, no witnesses could not give a description of the shooter or shooters even if the attack happened in broad daylight, at a very busy spot.
People, not just policemen or jail guards, who have business at either the Provincial Capitol or the Marcelo B. Fernan Palace of Justice usually enter and leave via the rear gate because it is only a few feet from a jeepney stop.
The rear gate also isn’t covered by the Provincial Government’s surveillance security system.
Yballe said he had to interview several people to piece together an initial narration of what happened.
Based on the initial interviews, the victim was shot once.
The shot caused him to fall. The rest of the shots were fired when he was already sprawled on the ground.
Scene of the Crime Operations (Soco) investigators recovered more than one type of cartridge casings, indicating that there could have been more than one shooter.
The shooters alighted from a small motorcycle that had been parked at a nearby bakery. They returned to the vehicle after the shooting and sped away in the direction of M. Velez St. (KNR)
