By Gerome M. Dalipe
Thursday, March 24, 2011
CATERER Maria Lina Mier implicated her daughter-in-law, Manilyn Mar-Mier, as the brains behind a foiled robbery last March 20.
She learned from the police that the suspects, Sim Abordo and Roldan Ranollo, were “hired by Manilyn, through Vicente Maestrado, to kill us,” Mier said in her affidavit submitted to the Cebu City Prosecutor’s Office.
Manilyn is a former chairperson of the Sangguniang Kabataan in Barangay Punta Princesa, as well as a former barangay councilor. She and Maestrado have not been arrested yet.
But Manilyn and Maestrado are now respondents in the robbery with frustrated homicide case the police filed against Abordo and Ranollo. The two men were arrested for
attacking Mier outside her office in Doña Maria Village, Barangay Punta Princesa, Cebu City last Sunday.
“A photograph of me and my husband was recovered from Abordo’s possession by the policemen,” Mier said in her affidavit.
The suspects, who first introduced themselves as Karl Labajo Dumat-ot and Arman Pabatan, signed a waiver for their continued detention at the police station.
In an interview after the inquest proceedings last Tuesday, Abordo told Sun.Star Cebu that Manilyn paid them P33,000 as a down payment. He said they didn’t push through with the plan because they were bothered by their conscience.
In her affidavit, Mier said she and her family members arrived in the office on Llamas St. at 11:40 a.m. An armed man suddenly grabbed her bag.
When Mier shouted for help, the suspect struck her in the head with his firearm several times. Mier saw another man pointing his gun at their security guard.
The suspect grabbed Mier’s bag, which contained two Nokia mobile phones worth P17,000, two wallets containing P340,000 cash and several cards and personal belongings.
But as the suspects were about to flee, Mier’s son, Kurt Yves, quickly drove his car against the suspects’ motorcycle, which threw both men off.
They fled
The bag got tangled in the motorcycle, so the suspects left it, boarded a taxi and escaped.
Mier’s driver and her secretary drove her to the hospital. Few hours later, Mier was told that the police arrested the suspects, shortly identified as Abordo and Ranollo.
Kurt, the 25-year-old son of Mier, executed a separate affidavit and corroborated his mother’s statement.
“Based on the evidence gathered by the policemen, I further know that the mastermind who is interested in the death of my parents is my wife Manilyn, through her middleman Maestrado,” Kurt said in his affidavit.
Kurt said he was preparing their vehicle to go to a mall for lunch last March 20, when he heard someone screaming for help.
He saw a man striking his mother in the head with a pistol, while grappling for her
bag. Kurt said he bumped the motorcycle when the riders seemed about to escape.
Jimmy Saylanon, a security guard of Maria Lina Catering, said in his affidavit that two young men visited the office and asked about catering services sometime in the first week of March.
Envelope
Three days later, Saylanon said, Manilyn gave him a brown envelop and instructed him to give it to someone who would come to the office.
Hours later, Saylanon said a woman arrived with a man, whom he later identifed as Abordo. The guard said he learned the woman who received the brown envelope is Abordo’s girlfriend.
Last Sunday, March 20, Saylanon said a man entered the catering office and pointed a gun at him, saying, “Sige, bunot!”
Afraid of being shot, the guard stood still. Saylonan said he was surprised when Abordo came in and took Mier’s bag. Like Mier’s son, the guard saw Abordo hit the businesswoman several times, using the gun.
The guard called the police for help.
At the police station, hours later, Saylonan identified Abordo and Ranollo as the culprits.
“Later, I learned that the brown envelope which Manilyn (Mier) handed to me contained the photograph of my employers Ernesto and Maria Lina Mier, after the policemen recovered it at the house of one of the suspects,” said Saylonan in his affidavit.
Police officers Jeffrey Simmons Diola, Rogelio Canete, Fortunato Macaranas, Reglyn Pepito and Renato Berido also executed their affidavits on the arrest of Abordo and Ranollo.
Text trail
At City Hall, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama said he hopes there is no truth to the report that the former barangay official was the mastermind in last Sunday’s robbery.
“I wish it’s not true, because I know both of them,” said Rama.
The mayor said he has no idea where Manilyn is now.
Sun.Star Cebu repeatedly tried to contact her but received no response.
Part of the investigators’ proof is a set of text messages on the plans for the robbery.
SPO3 Rogelio Canete and his team went to the National Telecommunications Commission to trace the text messages the alleged middleman sent to Sim Labajo, one of the suspects.
The text messages were found in Labajo’s cell phone.
“We need thorough validation because we don’t also discount the possibility that these two suspects had just pinpointed Manilyn Mier,” said Intelligence Branch Chief Romeo Santander.
Santander added the police need to catch the middleman first.
Pictures and the address of the alleged middleman were submitted to their counterpart intelligence unit for a complete background check.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on March 24, 2011.
Ex-SK official ‘behind attack’ of Maria Lina Mier (owner of Maria Lina Catering)
Originally Posted by jude86
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