P200K reward for poll crime suspect’s info

Barangay chair wins thru drawing lots

DAVAO DEL SUR - The provincial police office announced on Thursday that they are preparing a reward of P200,000 for those who can pin down the suspects in four election-related incidents in Digos City.

Senior Supt. Ronaldo Llanera, provincial police director, called the incidents as terrorist acts considering suspects planned to burn two public schools with the use of Molotov bombs, shot up Mati barangay hall using high-powered firearms, wounding one tanod and throwing of a Belgium made PRB 423 fragmentation grenade to the house of Provincial Pros. Artemio Tajon.

Llanera said they have identified the mastermind of the suspects but need strong evidence to pinpoint him.

He said they believed that with such reward witnesses can be named soon.

“The witness will be placed under protection program,” Llanera said.”

Meanwhile, Maria Febes Barlaan, provincial election supervisor, said the grenade throwing might have targeted election canvassers because Tajon was also a member of the provincial board of canvassers last May 2013 elections.

Llanera said they are also connecting the suspects on throwing of a hand grenade in Malita town on October 28.

Earlier, Justice Sec. Leila De Lima condemned the grenade-throwing incident at Tajon’s house.

In a statement, De Lima said, “in the strongest terms possible” the collective condemnation of the Department of Justice (DOJ) against what she calls an “act of cowardice and intimidation” directed at Pros. Tajon.

Police said unidentified suspect(s) were on board a black pick-up truck.

“[The incident] not only caused damage to property, but also the endangerment of the life and limb of the residents, and the desecration of the sanctity of the sense of peace and security that every person has the right to expect within the safety of his or her own home,” de Lima said.

“For our prosecutors to be subjected to this sort of menace is an offense, not just against Pros. Tajon, or his family, or to the National Prosecution Service of which he is a member, or even the DOJ as an institution, but against the Filipino people as a whole, as they all rely on public officials, such as our public prosecutors, to do their jobs without fear or favor,” De Lima said in a statement.