By CYRUS M. GARDE
BACOLOD City — A woman with a nervous breakdown and her three-year-old daughter were found dead in Room 20 of Pension Bacolod on 11th Street here past 12 noon yesterday.
Leah Segovia–Cañete, 34, was found in the bathroom hanged with a nylon rope, said Inspector Stephen Boniba, Police Station 2 chief.
Her daughter, found on the bed, had slashed wrists. She was identified by her grandmother, Luz Segovia, as Hannah Kate Cañete.
Scene of the crime operatives from the Negros Occidental Police Provincial Office led by Chief Inspector Ramonit Javier found in the room a blade, which they believe was used on the girl.
Investigators believe Cañete first slashed the wrists of her daughter and then hanged herself.
The bodies will undergo autopsy to determine if there was foul play, said Senior Police Officer 3 Arlene Torendon, acting head of the Bacolod City Police Office’s Women and Children Protection Desk.
The victims checked in the pension house at 6:40 p.m. Thursday and were supposed to check out at 12 noon yesterday but failed.
A room boy, identified only as Froilan, knocked on the door of Room 20 and tried to ask if the Cañetes wanted to extend their stay, but no one answered him.
The management opened the door using a duplicate key, only to find the lifeless bodies.
It was learned that Cañete and her daughter were staying with the mother’s in-laws in Barangay Lopez Jaena, Murcia town.
Cañete’s husband, Joebert, was working as a security guard in Cavite. Their daughter was supposed to celebrate her fourth birthday on Sept. 27.
Cañete and her daughter left Murcia at about 5 p.m. Thursday allegedly to buy milk. Her husband reportedly sent her P3,000 that day.
When she failed to come back home, her brother-in-law sent a text message to Cañete’s mother, Luz Segovia, who was living in Barangay Vista Alegre here, asking if Cañete was with them.
Segovia sought for her daughter in downtown Bacolod.
According to Segovia, her daughter developed a nervous breakdown six months ago.
A week ago, Cañete told her mother that she was always having a headache and could not sleep well and that she had a urinary tract infection.
Investigation on the case continues./PN
