Tuesday, July 06, 2004 2 cops, 3 others killed in Cavite shootout
MANILA -- Five people, two of them policemen, were killed in a shootout at a town in Cavite Monday dawn.
Killed were Senior Police Officer 4 Leandro Causaren of the Western Police District (WPD), Senior Police Officer 2 Reynaldo Santos of the Cavite provincial police and civilians Domingo Bawalan, John Edralin Jamon and Rene Amparo.
Investigators said they are still trying to discover what sparked the gunfight but ruled out the involvement of communist guerrillas or terrorists in the shootout in Amadeo town, Cavite province.
Police are initially looking at a political rivalry angle, as some of the fatalities were linked to local candidates in the May 10 elections.
In particular, one of the slain policemen, Santos, was reportedly a relative of the mayor's political rival.
Authorities said they are set to invite Amadeo Mayor Albert Ambagan to answer some questions concerning the incident, which reportedly took place at 2 a.m. in the boundaries of Barangays Tamacan and Banay-Banay.
A report to PNP Director for Operations Avelino Razon Jr. said that prior to the shootout, the Amadeo municipal police received a call from Mayor Ambagan about some trouble. A few minutes later, they received another call, from a certain Susan Patam, informing them about a shooting incident.
Police who responded to the alarm found five dead people at the site of the incident.
They said that while on their way to the scene of the clash, they saw the vehicle of Ambagan and another back-up vehicle speeding away in the opposite direction.
The responding policemen recovered from the scene a caliber .38 revolver with six rounds of ammo, M203, seven magazines for M16 armalite rifle, six magazines for M14 rifle, Cannon camera, Mitsubishi Space Gear van with plate RBA-159, Toyota Corolla with plate TES-767 and several ammunitions.
Also in the report to Razon, the municipal police said that prior to the incident, Causaren and Santos reportedly accosted and disarmed some members of the civilian security team of Ambagan as they were not authorized to carry firearms.
The security team reported the incident to the mayor who confronted the two policemen. A heated argument that might have caused the shootout possibly ensued, added the police. JFF
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