COPS BURN P10 MILLION MARIJUANA IN KAPANGAN

CAMP DANGWA, La Trinidad -- Around P10,840,000 worth of marijuana was
uprooted and destroyed by personnel of the Benguet Provincial Police Office
in an eradication operation conducted in a remote sitio of Kapangan on Tuesday.

Although no suspected cultivator or plantation owner was arrested, token
samples of the uprooted illegal cannabis sativa hemp plant were transported
to the Kapangan Municipal Police Station later for evidentiary purposes.

Chief Supt. Rowland Albano, director of the Police Regional Office in the
Cordillera, on Saturday said the eradication operation was led by Insp.
Darnell Dulnuan, officer-in-charge of the Kapangan MPS, in sitio Lao-angan,
Barangay Gadang of the same town at around 10AM of November 16.

About 52,000 fully-grown marijuana plants and 11,000 half-grown marijuana
seedlings were destroyed during the operation.

"All of these, except for the samples of evidence brought to the Kapangan
MPS, were burned at the site," he added.

Albano said over P256-million worth of marijuana and other illegal drugs
were either confiscated or destroyed within the region starting this year.