By CYRUS M. GARDE
ESCALANTE City — Three steel cash boxes and several checks that were among those robbed from the city hall here were found in Sitio Varca, Barangay Jonob-Jonob.
A passerby found the items beside a sugarcane field, said Supt. Leo Batiles, city police chief.
Jonob-Jonob village is located in the outskirts of the city next to Toboso town.
In the boxes recovered at about 3 p.m. were 11 checks amounting to P740,830.
Batiles confirmed that the items were part of the P2 million worth of cash and checks taken from the vault of the City Treasurer’s Office.
Police have already identified the suspect but refused to disclose the identity.
Batiles said the suspect was among the 11 city government employees who had undergone fingerprinting under the provincial police’s Scene of the Crime Operatives.
He said they will file robbery charges based on circumstantial evidence in the absence of a witness.
Identifying the suspect would have been easier had there been closed-circuit television cameras installed in the city hall, authorities earlier said.
Upon the provincial government’s request, the National Bureau of Investigation helped in the probe./PN
