RSOTG scores against PAG in Samar

By RPCRD, Police Regional Office 8
December 24, 2012

CAMP SEC. RUPERTO K. KANGLEON, Palo, Leyte  –  The Regional Special Operation Task Group (RSTOG) of the Police Regional Office 8 (PRO8) scored in its stepped-up campaign against Partisan Armed Groups (PAGs) with the neutralization of Samar’s most wanted criminal and PAG member in an encounter in a hinterland village in Gandara town early morning yesterday.

“We aimed to dismantle these PAGs to ensure a peaceful elections next year as the RSOTG is directed to arrest all PAG members with existing warrants of arrest”, Police Regional Director Police Chief Superintendent Elmer Ragadio Soria said.

Soria identified the slain PAG member as Julito Aragon y Cachero alias Nonoy, 30, single, a member of Moloboco PAG operating in the First District of Samar.  Aragon is listed as the Number One Most Wanted Person in Samar province and wanted for two counts of murder.

Reports reaching PRO8 from Police Senior Superintendent Edgardo Basbas, RSOTG Commander, disclosed that focused police operation conducted by joint elements of RSOTG Tracker Team 1, Second Company of Regional Public Safety Battalion and Gandara Police Station at around 4:30 in the early morning of December 23 in the hinterlands of Brgy. Peñaplata in Gandara, Samar led to the neutralization of the suspect.

The team, led by Police Inspector Chamberline Ludevice, was armed with arrest warrants for two murder cases docketed under criminal case numbers 11-0514 and 5516 dated May 25, 2012 and August 31, 1999 issued by Regional Trial Court Branch 41 and 3rd Municipal Circuit Trial Court both of Gandara, Samar with no bail recommended, respectively.

“Instead of surrendering peacefully, Aragon opted to shoot it out with our policemen, prompting the law enforcers to return fire,” Soria added.

The suspect was hit on the different parts of his body causing his instantaneous death.

Police recovered from the suspect one Colt MK IV .45 caliber pistol bearing serial number 655915 loaded with 6 live ammunitions.

The incident scene was properly preserved and processed by the responding SOCO Team from Western Samar Provincial Crime Laboratory Office while cadaver of the slain suspect was brought to Gandara District Hospital for post mortem examinations.

The Moloboco PAG, in which the suspect belongs, is one of the two remaining PAG aside from the Montealto group operating in Samar province that was named recently as one of the 15 “priority areas” by the Department of Interior and Local Government.