InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5
MANILA, Philippines - A suspect in the November 23, 2009 Ampatuan massacre eluded arrest Thursday, authorities said.
Chief Superintendent Benito Estipona, chief of Special Investigating Task Group Maguindanao, said the suspect, Mads Utto, was a “close-in security” of the Ampatuan clan, whose key members are accused of planning and leading the mass murder of 58 persons, 32 of them media workers.
Colonel Leopoldo Galon, spokesman of the military's Eastern Mindanao Command, said authorities tried to serve an arrest warrant against Utto in Barangay Manungkaling, Mamasapano town around 2 p.m. but failed to find him.
Instead, authorities recovered an M16 rifle, four rifle grenades and a hand grenade.
Utto is allegedly hiding with criminal elements in the area.
Of the 196 people accused of the massacre, 100 more remain at large.
Utto’s arrest would have made him the 97th massacre suspect to be apprehended and brought the number of those still at large below the 100 mark.
