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Tuesday, January 21, 2003
Armed men hit bus, wound conductor
CEBU -- Six armed men robbed a northbound Philippine Cebu Bus Lines (PCBL) bus Sunday night, fleeing with more than P8,000 cash, cellular phones and jewelry in Bogo, Cebu.
The last robber that got off the non-air-conditioned PCBL bus shot at close range and seriously wounded bus conductor Quirino Potestad, 29, married of Barangay Manyo, San Remigio, said SPO4 Alberto Ygot of Bogo police station.
The shooting happened after the robbers took the bus earnings of P4,000 and Potestad's P2,700 personal money and wristwatch. This was the first bus robbery reported this year.
Potestad was rushed to the Severo Verallo Memorial Hospital in Bogo but was later transferred to a hospital in Cebu City.
The bus was carrying 13 passengers, among them an American national, when one of the robbers, who was on the rear seat and armed with a .38 revolver, fired a shot into the roof and announced a heist at 11 p.m.
Some passengers had already alighted the vehicle when the men announced a robbery while the bus was travelling the highway in Barangay Babag, Bogo.
Another robber, who wore a mask, also poked a gun at bus driver Michael Batoctoy, 33, a resident of Tagbilaran City, Bohol.
All the suspects boarded the PCBL bus in Mandaue City.
Ygot told Sun.Star that the passengers can identify the robbers if they will see them again.
After they shot Potestad, the robbers then fled on foot towards a sugarcane farm of Hacienda Filomena in Sitio San Antonio, Binabag, which is 10 kilometers away from the Bogo proper.
Monday morning, a team of police investigators from the Cebu Provincial Police Office, led by Senior Insp. Bienvenido Premne, took the cartographic sketches of the suspects as described by the victims.
The police have no idea yet who the suspects are, as they still have to determine whether they were neophytes, seasoned criminals or members of a syndicated group.
The passengers lost cash, cellular phones, jewelry and personal belongings.
Last Sunday's robbery came barely two months after four men robbed a Cebu City-bound PCBL in Compostela town in November last year.
Police investigators did not rule out that the armed men could be remnants of the notorious Macapas-Cabuenas holdup gang.
Maximo Macapas and Crisanto "Dianggo" Cabuenas were the known holdup gang leaders responsible for a series of robberies since 1996, victimizing passenger buses plying northern Cebu routes.
Macapas, along with kidnap-for-ransom suspect Alfredo Pelenio, died in a shootout with lawmen in Barangay Matutinao, Badian hours after they bolted the Bagong Buhay Rehabilitation Center in February 2000.
The Police Regional Office (PRO) 7 had called on bus companies to take extra security measures to prevent robbers from victimizing their passengers.
PRO 7 Chief of Staff Ronald Roderos even suggested that bus companies invest at least 10 percent of their profits in security measures. GC/With DRT of Superbalita |
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