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Saturday, February 19, 2005
'Shabu lab' sniffed in Hacienda Royale
By Albert B. Lacanlale
* Lab located inside P26M house and lot owned by Taiwanese
* House found abandoned
CITY OF SAN FERNANDO -- A posh subdivision in this city for some time may have become the lair of a big-time shabu manufacturer.
A combined group of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), PNP and Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) unearthed a shabu laboratory in a P26 million house-and-lot at the Hacienda Royale subdivision, in Barangay Baliti, here.
The property, a two-storey mansion, is reportedly owned by a certain Jaime Tan alias "Jimmy", a Taiwanese, who according to NBI Director Reynaldo Wycoco, may have been the same person who owned a warehouse-turned-shabu-lab in Valenzuela City which was raided by the NBI recently.
The house, equipped with a four-camera monitoring system, may have been abandoned for almost a month before it was stormed by government operatives Friday.
The suspects are apparently preparing for the Chinese New Year when they decided to abandon the house.
Wycoco said the house's occupants may have fled following the series of anti-narcotics operation conducted by government authorities.
By virtue of a search warrant issued last February 11 by Judge Omar T. Viola of Branch 56, Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Angeles City, the government operatives forced their way inside the abandoned building.
The group was assisted by NBI Region 3 Director Edward A. Villarta, assistant regional director Ruel M. Lasala and NBI Central Luzon head agent and executive officer of operations Narciso "Jun" Peña.
Beaune Villaraza, NBI forensic chemist, positively assessed the house as a shabu laboratory after recovering several chemicals and equipment from the premises.
Chemicals found within the house include two bags of activated charcoal used in whitening crystallized shabu; two bags of sodium hydroxide, a vital ingredient of shabu; and four five-gallon containers of suspected liquid shabu.
Also recovered from the house were several pieces of tooters; three chest-type freezers; one oven used in drying shabu; three hydrogen tanks; one vacuum machine; and several blister packs of assorted medicines, all of which have Chinese wordings.
Posted in several areas in the house are "no-smoking" signs, apparently due to the presence of highly flammable chemicals.
Wycoco said Tan is already included in the Bureau of Immigration's watch-list and a hold-departure order would be issued to prevent him from sneaking out of the country.
He said the hold order would come out once the NBI has filed a case of violation of Section 11 and 12 of Republic Act 9165.
Meanwhile, Representative Juan Miguel "Mikey" Arroyo, who arrived to oversee the operation with Pampanga Provincial Police Director Leonardo Espina and City of San Fernando Police Chief Nicanor S. Targa, suggested that the government may look into the possibility of confiscation and sale of the property in favor of the state.
"This is a sign that when government forces work in unison, crime can never prevail, especially in the President's province of Pampanga," Arroyo said.
(February 19, 2005 issue)
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