ANGELES CITY – Police probers said here yesterday that at least three suspects in the three-month old murder case that victimized a brother of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas governor Amando Tetangco and two of his companions here are already known to them, but witnesses who led their identification have yet to be persuaded to testify against them.
At the same time, Chief Inspector Danilo Mendoza, head of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) in Pampanga, also said that investigations in the killing of a former American cop James Basham here last Sept.19 seemed to indicate lovers’ quarrel.
This, even as Mendoza also noted that the ongoing probe on the murder of Briton Bruce Anthony Jones last Sept. 21 seem headed towards the victim’s involvement in a gun smuggling case uncovered when a ship, of which he was captain, was found with heavy arms in Bataan last year.
Mendoza said that while Task Force Tetangco-Yap already has the names of three suspects in the killing of Rene Tetangco, brother of the BSP governor, his friend Florencio Yap and Yap’s aide Dennis Guinto in this city last June 2, no charges could yet be filed amid the reluctance of witnesses to testify.
“They’re all afraid, so we are trying to persuade them to testify with assurances for their safety,” he said.
The bodies of the three victims were found in Yap’s sports utility van on a vacant lot in barangay Pampang on June 3, after they were murdered apparently elsewhere the previous night on their way to play poker at the King’s Poker and Sports Club here.
Mendoza said, however, that task force probers are “confident of solving the Basham case soon”, even as he declined to express the same sentiment on the Jones case which he described as “too deep.”
Jones, Mendoza confirmed, was a state witness in the case of the Panama-registered ship which was found with 54 Indonesian Galil rifles worth P25 million off the coast of Mariveles, Bataan in July last year. Fifteen already empty crates were also found on the ship.
A pending criminal case on the arms smuggling incident in Bataan is now pending before a Quezon City court, with respondents with names that sound either foreign or Filipino.
Suspects in the case of Basham were not professionals, as indicated by the improvised short firearm with armalite bullet that they used, Mendoza said. A witness even described the face of the gunman who had removed his full motorcycle helmet while waiting for Basham. As in the case of Jones, the suspects also used a motorcycle to flee.
“It would seem that the crime had something to do with a lovers’ quarrel. Basham had another girlfriend and had quarreled with his wife whom he wanted to leave,” Mendoza said.
At the same time, Chief Inspector Danilo Mendoza, head of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) in Pampanga, also said that investigations in the killing of a former American cop James Basham here last Sept.19 seemed to indicate lovers’ quarrel.
This, even as Mendoza also noted that the ongoing probe on the murder of Briton Bruce Anthony Jones last Sept. 21 seem headed towards the victim’s involvement in a gun smuggling case uncovered when a ship, of which he was captain, was found with heavy arms in Bataan last year.
Mendoza said that while Task Force Tetangco-Yap already has the names of three suspects in the killing of Rene Tetangco, brother of the BSP governor, his friend Florencio Yap and Yap’s aide Dennis Guinto in this city last June 2, no charges could yet be filed amid the reluctance of witnesses to testify.
“They’re all afraid, so we are trying to persuade them to testify with assurances for their safety,” he said.
The bodies of the three victims were found in Yap’s sports utility van on a vacant lot in barangay Pampang on June 3, after they were murdered apparently elsewhere the previous night on their way to play poker at the King’s Poker and Sports Club here.
Mendoza said, however, that task force probers are “confident of solving the Basham case soon”, even as he declined to express the same sentiment on the Jones case which he described as “too deep.”
Jones, Mendoza confirmed, was a state witness in the case of the Panama-registered ship which was found with 54 Indonesian Galil rifles worth P25 million off the coast of Mariveles, Bataan in July last year. Fifteen already empty crates were also found on the ship.
A pending criminal case on the arms smuggling incident in Bataan is now pending before a Quezon City court, with respondents with names that sound either foreign or Filipino.
Suspects in the case of Basham were not professionals, as indicated by the improvised short firearm with armalite bullet that they used, Mendoza said. A witness even described the face of the gunman who had removed his full motorcycle helmet while waiting for Basham. As in the case of Jones, the suspects also used a motorcycle to flee.
“It would seem that the crime had something to do with a lovers’ quarrel. Basham had another girlfriend and had quarreled with his wife whom he wanted to leave,” Mendoza said.
