2 persons, including relative of victim, invited in probe
She would have celebrated her birthday today. But Aireen Adolfo, 24, lies inside a coffin after she was killed last Sunday.
“I can still remember how beautiful her smile was when she greeted everyone. She’s good to anyone she met,” Jenny Bontuyan, 21, Adolfo’s cousin and best friend, said.
She said that Aireen, a call center agent and a model, appeared to her in a dream yesterday dawn hours after the family identified the body.
“In my dreams, she was lying down, pale and thin. I held her hand and told her, ‘Chix, please fight. Because we love you so much,’ and we sang her the happy birthday song when she opened her eyes,” Bontuyan said.
Aireen’s uncle, Virgilio Adolfo, 54, cried while looking at his niece.
“These kids were all so close to me. It’s so painful because her death was so brutal, she was treated not as a human but like an animal,” he said.
Aireen was found in a grassy lot in Barangay Pulangbato, her face smashed and unrecognizable, next to a bloodied rock.
“Whenever I look at her now, I knew she really suffered at the hands of the criminals. This was not the smile that lit this house, the smile that touched many people’s hearts,” Bontuyan said, her voice shaking.
Leah, the victim’s mother, wants the culprits to pay for the crime.
“We will not rest until the culprits are brought to justice,” she said.
Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) Director Joel Doria said investigators are looking at a robbery-homicide angle.
“Her bag was found washed out in the river. Her money, phone and other valuables were not there anymore. But the question here is, why did they have to kill her that way?” Doria said.
Doria said their Police Community Relations (PCR) and other agencies may conduct an infor- mation drive to habal-habal, taxi and jeepney drivers to allow passengers to take their photos and plate numbers.
“If you’re not hiding anything, then allow your passengers to take your photos for their safety, so that they can send it to their relatives as you are the ones transporting them to their destination,” Doria said.
The Investigation and Detective Management Branch (IDMB), headed by their chief, Supt. Ryan Devaras, the Homicide Section, and the Talamban Police invited two men for questioning.
They are Sherwin “Jingle” Velasquez, Aireen’s uncle and one of Talamban Police Station’s high-value targets, and Ramonito Tribunalo. Both had been accused of robbery and illegals drugs in the past.
“They have records in the Police Station 8 for robbery and drugs so during the investigation we found out that there was a link in the crime,” Devaras said.
Devaras said the victim’s bag was discovered a few meters from Velasquez’s house. However, the two are still considered as persons of interest as authorities have yet to gather evidence from witnesses and from close-circuit television (CCTV) cameras against them, Devaras said.
Talamban police also confiscated shabu from Velasquez and seized from Tribunalo bullets, a sickle and a motorcycle with no keys and no plate number. Both denied a hand in the killing.
“She’s my niece. We are good friends with her father so why would I do that to her? I’m even angry at how she was brutally killed and was planning to visit her wake,” Velasquez said. He said he was at a cockfight at the time of the incident.
Tribunalo said he sometimes picked up passengers as a habal-habal driver but from Saturday to Monday he stayed home as his motorcycle was damaged.