ILOILO City – The city government employee arrested in a buy-bust operation of the police Friday night last week had his name in the “tokhang” drop box at city hall.
Winstone Porras, who was caught around 9:50 p.m. on Aug. 10 in Barangay Fatima, Jaro district, was in fact the first city government regular employee named in the box, according to City Administrator Hernando Galvez.
“The police’s positive operation against Porras confirmed the tip in the tokhang box,” he said.
Porras was subjected to a drug test after his name was dropped in the box but he passed the test, recalled Galvez.
Porras sold to an undercover police officer a sachet of shabu for P1,600. Arrested with him was 24-year-old Jerky Marie Jubelag whom the police identified as a commercial sex worker.
Porras was an administrative assistant at the City Planning and Development Office.
“We’ve been consistently monitoring him. Eventually, it was our authorities who got him,” said Galvez.
As part of the procedure in administrative cases, a “notice of charge” would be issued to Porras and thereafter judgment would be rendered,” according to the city administrator.
“The administrative proceeding in the city government is separate from the criminal complaint that the police would be filing against Porras,” said Galvez.
The police would charge Porras with violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.
The city government made available a tokhang drop box at the city hall lobby beginning Sept. 18 last year. Then acting mayor Jose Espinosa III encouraged employees to discreetly slip into it pieces of paper containing the names of colleagues they suspected were into illegal drugs.
City hall chief of security Felix Muchada, a retired police superintendent, was tasked to monitor the drop box.
Galvez said Porras’ arrest should serve as a warning to other city hall employees who were into illegal drugs.
Porras was not the first city hall employee busted for illegal drugs. A casual employee was arrested with 11 others in a police antidrug operation in Barangay San Jose, Arevalo district on Sept. 13, 2017.
Noel Uy, 37, of Barangay General Hughes-Montes, City Proper was a member of the Iloilo City Anti-Smoking Task Force.
It was Uy’s arrest that prompted Espinosa to make a tokhang drop box./PNglenda
