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[av_heading heading=’Ozamiz mayor killed in raid ‘ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”]
BY ADRIAN STEWART CO
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MANILA – A mayor whom President Rodrigo Duterte publicly linked to the illegal drug trade was one of those the police shot and killed yesterday in San Roque Lawis, Ozamiz City.
Officers from the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group regional office, Misamis Occidental Police Provincial Office and Ozamiz City police station were to serve search warrants when the security personnel of Ozamiz mayor Reynaldo Parojinog Sr. reportedly fired at them.
Parojinog was suspected of illegally possessing firearms.
The search warrants covered Parojinog’s house in San Roque Lawis, the house of former provincial board member and incumbent Ozamiz councilor Ardot Parojinog, and the mayor’s farm in Barangay Cogon.
The incident happened around 2:30 a.m., according to Northern Mindanao police spokesperson Superintendent Lemuel Gonda.
“When we were trying to serve a search warrant … our policemen was fired by Mayor Parojinog’s security personnel. So our policemen countered,” Gonda said in a televised news conference.
Mayor Parojinog’s wife Susan, Misamis Occidental provincial board member Octavio Parojinog Jr., and civilian volunteers Miguel del Victoria, Nestor Cabalan and Daniel Vasquez were killed, too. Police have yet to identify at least five other casualties.
Mayor Parojinog’s daughter, Vice Mayor Nova Parojinog-Echaves, was arrested and being investigated by the Ozamiz City police.
Echaves was earlier tagged as a girlfriend of New Bilibid Prison high-profile inmate Herbert Colangco.
Aside from the several high-powered firearms, the raiding police officers also recovered bundles of money and suspected drug paraphernalia from the houses of Mayor Parojinog and his relatives.
The officers were “met with volleys of fire from (the mayor’s) security, prompting the Philippine National Police personnel to retaliate,” Chief Superintendent Timoteo Pacleb said in a statement.
Parojinog, who also faced corruption charges, had denied any link to illegal drugs.
He was the third mayor to be killed under Duterte’s bloody crackdown on drugs, which left more than 3,000 dead in reported gunfights with police.
Last year, police officers shot dead Albuera mayor Rolando Espinosa Sr. inside a jail cell in Leyte province.
A week before that, another mayor and his nine bodyguards were gunned down allegedly during a firefight on a road in southern Philippines.
All three mayors were among more than 160 officials Duterte named publicly as “drug coddlers” in August last year.
Duterte has vowed not to stop until, he said, the last drug trafficker in the country has been eliminated. (With The Associated Press/PN)
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