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Friday, January 20, 2006
Death sentence on photographer’s killer
By Jujemay G. Awit
CEBU CITY -- Businessman Edgar Belandres, 41, was sentenced to death Thursday for the murder of photojournalist Allan Dizon.
Regional Trial Court (RTC) Judge Ireneo Gako convicted Belandres, despite the prosecution’s failure to present a motive and Belandres’ admission during the trial that he and Dizon were friends.
Judge Gako ruled there were no reasons to doubt the testimonies of the three prosecution eyewitnesses who were along Soriano St. when Dizon was shot and killed on Nov. 27, 2004.
Justiniano Doller, Epifanio Barcoma and Alma Maraviles, all jeepney dispatchers near SM mall, testified that they saw Belandres take off his helmet before shooting Dizon.
Belandres, the witnesses said, looked like he was waiting for someone along Soriano St., near a carwash. After a while, he approached a nearby motorcycle with a driver and asked for a helmet, which he wore until right before he shot Dizon.
He was then seen speeding away on the same motorcycle.
No ill will
The witnesses also testified that they heard Dizon say, “Ayaw parts, silingan ra ta (Don’t shoot me, we’re neighbors),” after the first gunshot. Two other shots followed, despite the plea.
Dizon and Belandres were neighbors in Barangay Lorega.
“The court noted that these witnesses are mere dispatchers with little schooling and it was their first time to appear and testify in court, and yet their narration of the incident is spontaneous, straight-forward and animated,” Judge Gako stated in his decision.
“Besides, no evidence was presented by the defense to prove that the witnesses were actuated by ill will and improper motive against the accused,” Gako added.
The judge also noted an inconsistency in the accounts on where Belandres was during the shooting of Dizon.
Phone proof
The accused testified that he was watching a cockfight in Barangay Lorega the whole afternoon of Nov. 27, then played billiards that night.
However, he also admitted that he was the “DD” listed on Dizon’s cell phone, which the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) 7 retrieved. “DD” had sent Dizon a message around 4 p.m. that day, saying he was still in Liloan.
The defense maintained that Belandres was only used as a scapegoat, and that the media pressured authorities to solve the case immediately, considering that Dizon was a news photographer.
“By and large, the defenses of the accused are denials and alibi, but the defense of alibi is unavailing when the accused is positively identified and there is no physical impossibility for him to be at the crime scene when it happened,” the 19-page decision read.
3 blows
Judge Gako noted that three aggravating circumstances were present in the murder of Dizon: the use of a getaway vehicle; the use of an unlicensed firearm; and the use of a helmet to hide the gunman’s identity.
The prosecution presented seven witnesses, while the defense had eight.
But Chief Inspector Crisaleo Tolentino of the CIDG, who investigated the Dizon murder, commented that perhaps the defense was jeopardized by their own witnesses.
Tolentino was presented as a defense witness, yet he pointed out that his testimony did not prove in any way that Belandres was innocent.
He took the stand to present the cellular phone that the CIDG retrieved from the crime scene. That was where they read messages from “DD”—later identified as Belandres.
Among those messages were, “Naa pa mi Liloan dapit (We are still in Liloan),” “Adto lang dapit kilid sa carwash (That area beside the carwash)” and “Taud-taud lang kay na-aberya me diri (Wait a while, we’re having some engine trouble.)”
Both the Belandres and Dizon families attended the reading of Thursday’s decision.
While Belandres was heard consoling his wife and five weeping children, telling them not to worry, the tears that the widow Amelina Dizon shed were of relief. (Sun.Star Cebu)
(January 20, 2006 issue)
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