THE 14-year-old girl found dumped in a septic tank in Danao City bore 34 stab wounds, and police missed catching her killer in his house.
Dr. Benjamin Lara, medico-legal officer of the Philippine National Police (PNP)-Central Visayas Crime Laboratory, said his autopsy revealed that Tesa Marie Ygay had been stabbed in the neck and head 13 times, in her left arm 11 times, seven times in her body, twice in her left hand and once in her right hand.
There was no crack in her skull, and her brain did not show hemorrhage.
Because Ygay’s body was already decomposing, it was difficult for the medico-legal officer to ascertain if she had been raped.
She had been dead for more than 72 hours when Danao City police found her body in an open septic tank behind a public elementary school in Barangay Cogon Cruz.
She was not pregnant, Lara said.
From the wounds on her arms, it was clear that Ygay parried the knife or bladed instrument used in attacking her, Lara said.
Danao City Police Chief Lieutenant Colonel Maribelle Getigan told reporters that they had identified a security guard to be the girl’s killer.
Police have not been able to arrest the suspect, Jessie Montes Medequillo, 36, whom Ygay and her family met and knew.
Medequillo is a security guard at the school where Ygay’s body was found.
At dawn of April 9, Danao City police went to Medequillo’s house in Barangay Tuburan Sur only to miss him, Getigan said. “Nagkabalikwas” was how she put it.
The police chief said they continue to look for Medequillo.
Ygay’s father reported her missing last week when she did not come home. Ygay was living with her father in Lapu-Lapu City to keep her away from Medequillo, who had been threatening her.
Medequillo was wooing his daughter and was possessive of her, Felimon Enoy said.
Last March 25, Medequillo shaved his daughter’s head in a fit of jealousy and to stop her from going out with friends, Enoy said.
Medequillo had also burned his daughter’s clothes.
Enoy said he learned that his daughter had gone back to Danao upon the demand of Medequillo who had threatened to kill her.
Enoy said he and his family went to Danao last Saturday, April 6, and checked on Medequillo in the school where he was assigned to look for Ygay.
A fellow security guard told him to check the guard house because blood was all over it and that someone had seen his daughter entering it.
Neither Medequillo nor his daughter was in the guard house.
What Enoy found instead were a knife, a pick, a steel pipe and a rock traced with blood. He reported to the police what he saw as well as his daughter missing.
Ygay and her family had known Medequillo since she was 10 years old. The security guard had been sending her to school and he would take her with him during his duty. He often had her sleep over at the guard house, police chief Getigan said.
In another case, on March 11, a 16-year-old girl, Christine Lee Silawan, was found dead with a grotesque face in an open lot in Barangay Bankal, Lapu-Lapu City.
Her former boyfriend was arrested a few days after a P2-million bounty was put up.
On Tuesday, April 9, another suspect was arrested. (MPS with reports from FVQ & AYB of SuperBalita Cebu)