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By Francis
Earl A. Cueto, Reporter
A judge in
Cagayan de Oro City is seeking the help of the National Bureau of
Investigation in securing custody of witness in the shabu tiangge
case in Pasig City who the police refuses to turn over.
Judge Gil
Bollozos of the Misamis Oriental Regional Trial Court in Cagayan de
Oro wants the witness, Samer Palao, present for his arraignment on
February 28 on a kidnapping charge.
Bollozos
ordered the court’s process server Eleanor Neri-Pasion to
coordinate with the NBI in Metro Manila in serving the subpoena to
Palao.
Palao,
formerly known as Mangandama Boratong, is testifying in a drug
trafficking case in Pasig filed by the Antiillegal Drugs Special
Operations Task Force against his brother, Amin Imam Boratong.
A
self-confessed “right hand” of Boratong, Palao surrendered to
the Pasig police in July, a day after a court issued a warrant for
his arrest for a charge of kidnapping with murder against his own
brother-in-law Cader Haji Salam in Lanao del Sur.
Palao said
Boratong ran the shabu “supermarket” in Pasig busted by AIDSOTF
agents on February 10, 2006.
Last November,
Boratong and his mistress, Sheryll Molera, were arrested by NBI
agents in a condominium in Makati City.
Tension
gripped Thursday’s hearing before Judge Abraham Borreta of the
Pasig Regional Trial court Branch 154 after NBI agents arrived to
enforce Bollozos’ order to take custody of Palao.
The police
officers holding Palao refused to turn him over and instead brought
him back to his PNP detention cell.
It was not the
first time the Cagayan de Oro judge was rebuffed in gaining custody
of Palao. Earlier this month, Bollozos had ordered Senior Inspector
Lorenzo Trajano and Inspector Reynaldo Ramos, custodians of Palao
and members of the Pasig police, to bring him to his court for
arraignment.
Bollozos noted
in his order that Trajano, as reported by the process server, had
refused to receive the court order on February 13.
The judge
ordered the acting clerk of court to issue separate subpoenas to
Insp. Reynaldo Ramos of Philippine National police Special Action
Force Custodial Service/Center in Camp Crame; to jail warden/officer
in charge of the PNP Special Action Force in Fort Sto. Domingo, Sta.
Rosa, Laguna, to force them to turn over Palao to the NBI agents.
Bollozos
issued the subpoenas for the police authorities on February 21.
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