Saturday, October 11, 2008 ‘Imaginative’ officer gets 14-17 years By Katrina A. Balmaceda Sun.Star Correspondent
EVEN after creating a fictional character to be his scapegoat, a senior police officer did not escape a judge’s verdict last Wednesday.
Regional Trial Court (RTC) Judge Simeon Dumdum Jr. sentenced SPO1 Julito Capangpangan to 14 to 17 years in prison for stealing a Toyota Corona car 11 years ago.
However, three of Capangpangan’s co-accused got off scot-free, while one still remains at large until now, more than a decade after the loss.
One of them, Roy Gonzales, turned out to be a fictional character created by Capangpangan.
The car belonged to Dew Bijou Bajarias and was worth P120,000 when it was stolen on Oct. 22, 1996 between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.
Too dark
Bajarias used to park his car beside his neighbor’s house in a private subdivision in Bulacao, Talisay City.
The subdivision’s security guard, Joel Rezane, said that about 2:30 a.m. of Oct. 22, he saw three to four passengers speeding away with Bajarias’ car. It was too dark to see the passengers clearly, though.
Information led the team of Police Chief Insp. Pedro Talosig Jr. to Capangpangan’s house a month later, where Bajarias saw his car parked outside the policeman’s house.
On Dec. 5 that year, Talisog’s team arrived at Capangpangan’s house to seize the vehicle.
Plate
While waiting for Capangpangan, investigators reportedly peeped into the policeman’s house through a hole. Inside, they saw the plate number of Bajarias’ car as well as its front grill, back seat and seat covers.
They also saw side mirrors and tampered number plates.
Talisog, then the deputy regional chief of the Regional Traffic Management Office, said that Capangpangan blamed the carnapping on Gonzales, Eujan Flores, Randy
Lastimosa and Rene Ricarte. Capangpangan told him that Gonzales was his nephew.
Capangpangan later denied this, though.
He said that he met Gonzales through a friend who shared his love of music. Capangpangan used to be the band arranger and composer of Police Regional Office 7.
Tenant
Gonzales reportedly began renting a nipa hut outside Capangpangan’s house in the year 1995. The policeman further alleged that on Oct. 22, 1996, it was Gonzales who brought Bajarias’ car and parked it outside Capangpangan’s house.
Six days later, at the end of a fiesta celebration, Gonzales’ family reportedly fled the area.
Neither Capangpangan nor his wife could shed light on Gonzales’ livelihood, lifestyle or family, even after a year of renting out the nipa hut. This cast doubt on their tale.
Afterthought
The couple neither had proof he existed, such as pictures or registration papers with the Land Transportation Office and Commission on Elections, according to Dumdum.
Judge Dumdum also ruled that the contract of lease for the nipa hut and a cartographic sketch of Gonzales had “the color of an afterthought.”
“Leases of a nipa hut are not customarily put down in a formal written contract... The accused could have presented photographs, instead of a cartographic sketch, which only a cop like Capangpangan would have thought of,” the judge ruled.
The contract of lease was also not notarized. Since Capangpangan claimed that at his daughter’s birthday parties, Gonzales was present, the policeman would have had a picture of Gonzales, Dumdum explained.
