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BY RUBY SILUBRICO
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January 21, 2018
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Bacolod man falls in Iloilo sting op
PAVIA, Iloilo – Police and antidrug agents caught two suspected illegal drug couriers allegedly out to distribute dozens of plastic packs of shabu during the Dinagyang Festival.
The operation in Barangay Cabugao Sur happened a little more than a week before thousands of revelers are expected to flock to the nearby capital Iloilo City for the world-renowned celebration.
Arrested at around 11:30 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 19 were Andy Sause, 39, of Barangay Banago, Bacolod City and Jaser Galino, 20, of Barangay Libo-o, Dingle, Iloilo.
Sause sold to an undercover police operative a big plastic pack of shabu worth P25,000, said Chief Inspector Jonathan Pinuela, intelligence chief of the Iloilo Police Provincial Office (IPPO).
Thirty smaller plastic packs of the same substance worth P130,000 placed in a sling bag were further seized from Sause, while Galino yielded another big plastic pack of shabu worth P30,000, Pinuela added.
“The illegal drugs we recovered were intended for the Dinagyang Festival,” Pinuela said.
The IPPO staged the buy-bust operation with the Pavia municipal police station, in coordination with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).
Pavia, a second-class town of more than 40,000 residents, is around 10 kilometers north of the capital city, where Dinagyang activities are being held.
Sause was a “slippery target” – he has allegedly been going around for three years now but would always evade arrest – Pinuela claimed. “He (Sause) was in our target list as a (suspected) drug courier.”
Citing intelligence information, Pinuela said Sause “has two sources in Bacolod City” and supplies drugs not only in Bacolod but also in Iloilo City and some parts of Iloilo province.
From what they have so far gathered, Sause would deliver to Iloilo “twice a week” through the Iloilo and Dumangas ports, and hired Galino as an accomplice this year, said Pinuela.
“His (Sause) name has been in our lists since I was the police chief in Pavia,” Pinuela said, adding that dealing with Sause prior to the operation took days. “Masyado ka segurista, that’s why nabudlayahan kita mag-transact.”
Sause and Galino were detained at the custodial facility of the Pavia municipal police station.
Pinuela promised that the police will conduct more antidrug operations in the days leading to the Dinagyang Festival.
President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the Philippine National Police to return to the war on drugs in December 2017 after cutting them off his flagship program last October in light of criticisms that officers were killing drug suspects with impunity.
“We are zeroing in on the [drug dealers’] areas of operations,” Pinuela said without disclosing details. “We have more targets this week.”
The PDEA and the Police Regional Office 6 (PRO-6) are on their toes as Iloilo gears up for the 50th edition of the Dinagyang Festival, which is expected to attract not only tourists but drug traffickers as well.
There is a “big possibility” that drug syndicates will use new players the authorities are not familiar with, Senior Inspector Kennith Bermejo, chief of the PRO-6’s Regional Drug Enforcement Unit, had said.
Dinagyang highlights will be on Jan. 27 (Kasadyahan cultural contest) and 28 (ati-ati tribes competition).
Big PDEA-police operations may be staged to keep the festival drug-free, Bermejo said. Those in their drug watch lists – suspected pushers, runners and couriers – are under “tight watch,” he added./PN
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