Incident opens truth: cops are ill-equipped

THE bomb scare that hit 10 schools in Cebu City last Tuesday exposed the police’s lack of a special unit in dealing with real explosives.

Senior Supt. Joel Doria, the city police director, said they do not have an explosives ordnance disposal (EOD) team and bomb-sniffing dogs.

He said Mabolo Police Station Chief Jacinto Mandal is the only EOD expert under his wing.

May ni-request na tayo ng (We already requested) training for EOD personnel, nag-request na rin tayo ng equipment like bomb suit na may kamahalan din at yung lahat na puwede magamit natin (which is also expensive and everything else that we need),” Doria said.

He said certain breeds, like Retrievers and German Shepherds, are fit to be trained, but they are expensive.

Ang aso na hindi maganda ang breeding madaling ma-stress lalo na kung makakita ng maraming tao. Delikadong mangagat (Dogs with poor breeding easily get stressed out, especially in the presence of crowds),” Doria said.

The police official said they will file charges once they identify the culprit. He said it is possible that a caller was based in Cebu.

Police traced that the calls were reportedly from the same caller, a man, using the cell phone number 09351080039.

The Department of Education-Cebu City Division office first received the call.

The schools that also received the calls were Zapatera, Basak, Labangon, Don Carlos Gothong, Guadalupe, Cebu City Central, Mabolo, Tejero, Lahug, and Lusaran.

Investigators later learned the phone number is owned by Karen Mae Calautit, a public high school teacher in Ilagan City, Isabela in Luzon.

Calautit, in her Facebook account, denied she was the caller. She went to the police station in Ilagan City to clear her name.

Yesterday morning, a certain Diana dela Cruz posted in her Facebook account that her group planted a bomb in Mambaling National High School.

She wrote: “Hi Mam & Sir, Bantay2 lang mo basin mobuto na ang bomba among gibutang diha sa eskuylahan ninyu....daghan mga matay lagi...naay bomba diha sa eskuylahan ninyu bantay2 lang ... I.S maute group.

Doria said they will trace dela Cruz and charge her. He urged the public not to spread fear by posting threats in social media.

Another hoax

Classes in the Mambaling National High School were suspended yesterday following reports of an alleged bomb threat.

Authorities are asking the public to help identify dela Cruz, who was allegedly the first to spread reports of the bomb scare through her personal Facebook account. The account, though, is no longer searchable and may have been deactivated.

As a measure to prevent bomb scares and similar threats from happening again, Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña is considering giving cash rewards to anyone who can point to persons who are responsible for spreading hoaxes threatening security.

The amount, though, will depend on the information, which will be evaluated. Osmeña said this will be charged either to the City Government’s intelligence fund or his discretionary fund.

“It will prevent something from happening or it will allow us to find out who is responsible for something bad that happens. We’re not throwing away money, it’s to help improve our situation,” he said.

While authorities found that the bomb scares last Tuesday were all hoaxes, Osmeña did not deny the suspicion that these may be a form of initiation challenge for recruits of terror groups.

“There’s more to it than that. If you’re from Isabela, how did you get the telephone numbers of our principals here? That’s why we need the help of the community in intelligence gathering,” he said.

In a separate interview, Councilor Dave Tumulak, deputy mayor for police matters, said an investigation to track down the caller is still ongoing.

Based on the initial report, Tumulak said the caller may have done it intentionally considering the five-minute interval between calls.

“All calls were made via cellular phone, so this person really spent money just to threaten. We need more data because we may be filing charges for violation of malicious dissemination of information concerning bombs and for causing public disturbance,” he said. (RTF, KAL)

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