InterAksyon.com
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MANILA, Philippines -- (UPDATE - 2:54 p.m.) Four Makati City policemen were relieved from their posts after murder charges were filed against them for the killing of a businessman who headed a volunteer fire brigade and his companion last April 1.
On Thursday, the National Bureau of Investigation filed double murder and incriminatory machination charges against Police Officers 2 Elmandy Aconada and Carmelo Tuzon Jr., PO3 Christopher Leonen Abeleda and SPO1 Raul Gerabas.
Closed circuit television camera footage of the incident made public by the National Bureau of Investigation and shown on television newscasts tended to show that Ronald Infante, acting chief of the Manila-Setba fire volunteer brigade, and his companion, mechanic Jenny Almanon, were not killed in a shootout the evening of April 1 as claimed by police.
Earlier, police described the two as holdup suspects.
The footage also showed at least two men in civilian clothes moving the bodies of the victims and apparently planting a gun on one of them.
Infante’s peers said he might have been a victim of mistaken identity.
Following Infante’s death, volunteers from the fire brigade he led mounted a protest, hosing down the Makati City police station during Holy Week.
Senior Superintendent Generoso Cerbo, spokesman of the Philippine National Police, said the four policemen have been placed under restrictive custody at the National Capital Region Police Office headquarters in Taguig.
They will also be facing administrative cases of grave misconduct.
"We would like to emphasize that the PNP will never tolerate any wrongdoings in its ranks," Cerbo said.
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