HOUSE PROBES LOSS OF SHABU

A congressional inquiry will try to get to the bottom of the
mysterious discrepancy in the amount of shabu police may or may not
have confiscated from an alleged drug courier, Rep. Antonio Cuenco
said yesterday.

Cuenco said the inquiry, which he will propose as holdover chairman of
the committee on dangerous drugs at the House of Representatives, can
be expected to take place before the month ends.

Cuenco said he was forced to seek a congressional inquiry after his
own discreet investigation, as well as that by the Philippine Drug
Enforcement Agency, failed to shed light on what happened to half of a
four-kilo shipment of shabu members of the Maritime Police were
believed to have seized from suspected drug courier Willy Solon as he
disembarked in Cebu from a ship from Manila.

Solon had insisted that he was transporting four kilos of the banned
substance but the four Maritime Police personnel who effected the
seizure claimed to have confiscated only two kilos.

A kilo of shabu has an estimated street value of P2
million.

Solon had told Cuenco he was willing to undergo a polygraph test to
prove his claim but his lawyer, Noel Archival, later advised him
against taking the test, branding it as inconclusive and therefore
useless.

The four policemen, who similarly assured Cuenco of their own
willingness to take the test provided Solon does likewise, later
declined to do so on advice of their lawyer.

Lawyer Delon Orot wrote the PDEA that his clients, Senior Inspector
Roger Mangaoang, PO3 Florito Banilad, PO2 Eric Henry Deluna, and PO1
Napoleon Taneo, will only take the polygraph tests if Solon commits
his allegations on paper in a sworn statement and takes the same test
ahead of the policemen.

Given these developments, Cuenco said he believes the only way to
determine who is telling the truth and find out if two kilos of shabu
are really missing or not is for the House to step into the picture
and conduct the inquiry.

Cuenco said Solon may also reveal in the inquiry who had sent him to
Cebu to deliver the shabu. Solon had initially said he was asked to
make the delivery by a certain Archua to a resident of Labangon in
Cebu City.

In his talks with Solon, Cuenco said the suspect claimed the police
did not immediately report his arrest but tried to parlay his freedom
with a monetary demand to Archua by telephone from two pension houses
to where he was taken.

When the alleged negotiations fell through, the arrest was announced
the following day and Solon was presented to media, or so he claimed.

Cuenco admitted, however, that he foresees a problem arising from the
insistence of Solon's lawyer Archival that his client in the first
place never had any shabu with him at the time of his arrest last July
28.

PDEA regional director Gaudencio Pagaling yesterday explained his
delay in filing a case against the four policemen, saying he is just
waiting for the action of city prosecutors.

If prosecutors drop the case against Solon, Pagaling said, that will
be the time he will file a case against the police for bungling their
case.

Pagaling said that instead of coordinating with his office, the
arresting officers informed his office of the arrest only 13 hours
later, a crucial lapse of time that tended to corroborate the
contention of Solon that he was first brought to two pension houses
from where the alleged negotiations for the suspect's release
reportedly took place.

Pagaling did not say why he still has to wait for the action of
prosecutors before filing his own case against the Maritime Police
officers.