CEBU CITY – Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma is hoping for the speedy resolution of the case involving the brutal killing of a 16-year-old girl in Barangay Bankal, Lapu-Lapu City.
“I am appealing to the perpetrators to surrender. We are praying for justice for the family of the victim,” said Palma.
It has been a week since Christine Silawan, a Grade 9 student, was found dead in a vacant lot in Barangay Bankal. The girl was half-naked and her face skinned to the bone. The girl’s trachea, tongue, and esophagus are also missing.
Palma said various church organizations have extended assistance to the girl’s family. The victim served as alms collector at Sacred Heart Church in Barangay Pajac, Lapu-Lapu.
“Most importantly, I am praying that no other person will experience this type of a crime,” Palma said in an interview on the sidelines of the Pagsangyaw 2021 program of the Archdiocese of Cebu at the IEC Pavilion in Cebu City.
Palma said he is monitoring the progress of the investigation and is aware of the arrest of a man in Davao City.
The prelate urged the public to hold judgment until the police complete the investigation. “Everything else is suspicion until proven,” Palma said.
On Friday, law enforcers arrested Jonas Bueno in Davao City. Bueno was nabbed by virtue of an arrest warrant for a separate crime he allegedly committed last January in Cebu, but police now believe that he’s also responsible for the killing of Silawan.
Davao and Cebu police have come out with conflicting statements with regards to Bueno’s liability.
While Chief Supt. Marcelo Morales, director of the Philippine National Police Regional Office 11, tagged Bueno as the primary suspect, Senior Supt. Limuel Obon, chief of the Lapu-Lapu police, had denied reports that Bueno was a suspect.
However, Obon had made himself scarce after PNP spokesman Senior Supt. Bernard Banac confirmed that they are considering Bueno a suspect. Despite the suspect’s denial, police are pinning him down because of the similarity of how both victims were killed.
Like Silawan, Bueno’s alleged first victim – Trinidad Batucan – had his face peeled off and heart removed.
While they continue to gather evidence to pin down Bueno, Banac said Davao police have noted inconsistencies in the statements of Bueno who claimed during a tactical interrogation that he, his wife, two kids, and uncle, arrived in Davao City on March 5, six days before Silawan’s body was found.
Banac said this was different from the claims of Bueno’s wife (identity withheld) who said they had been in Davao City since Feb. 23.
“As of this time, the police are still determining when did they really arrive in Davao City because the statement of the suspect did not match with the statement of his wife. When asked by the police regarding the date of their arrival, their statements did not match,” he noted.
Morales earlier said that Bueno’s wife told the police they went to Davao to find a job. Bueno was arrested Friday at the house of the cousin of his wife in Barangay Matina Pangi.
He was apprehended on the strength of a warrant of arrest for alleged involvement in the killing of Batucan, a 60-year-old deaf-and-mute farmer, in Danao City, Cebu on Jan.13.
Morales said Bueno had admitted to killing Batucan but he denied his involvement in Silawan’s death.
Aside from the date of their arrival in Davao City, investigators also said that Bueno and his wife had conflicting statements on how they traveled from Cebu to Davao City.
According to Morales, Bueno claimed that they took a boat. His wife, on the other hand, claimed they traveled on land by boarding a bus.
Banac said the truth to these inconsistencies will be determined by the investigators as the probe deepens. “Patuloy na tinitignan ‘yan ng ating mga imbestigador sa Police Regional Office 7 at PRO- 1. Patuloy ang pag-estabish ng mga impormasyon para mabigyang-linaw itong kaso,” he said.
Meanwhile, the date of the transfer of Bueno from the detention facility of the National Bureau of Investigation in Davao City to Danao, Cebu has yet to be determined. (Martin Sadongdong and Calvin Cordova)
