After Oplan Tok-Hang, the police will be shifting to Oplan Wagtang; and so defiant drug personalities are warned.
However, there is no mechanism on hand yet to draw the line between the undertaking by the drug ring hit squad and those by law enforcers.
From either of the takers, a drug personality will just have to bite the dust one by one, probably on daily basis- -not a common goal, but a common result.
As of the last count, 135 had already been killed since President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office, or barely half a month, wherein 85 were through police operations and 51 by unidentified hitmen.
Meanwhile, an instruction from the higher level of the police hierarchy has allegedly been transmitted recently, warranting execution of drug personalities.
City chief of police, Supt. George Vale, reminded the remaining drug personalities of the Tok-hang deadline on Friday, July 15.
While Oplan Tok-hang tends to serve more the demand reduction as it shows majority of those who had yielded were drug users, Oplan Wagtang will prioritize heavy weights in the illegal drugs business.
According to the instruction, drug lords, shabu suppliers and pushers will be the priority targets of Oplan Wagtang.
This will be aimed at supply reduction in the campaign against illegal drugs.
The drug ring hit squad, however, had overtaken the police in the stride to the result sought with the murder of a rumored shabu godfather in Clarin, who happened to be a woman.
Investigators consider delinquency in the remittance of the proceeds from the shabu business as the possible motive for the murder of the victim identified as Alma Sabejon, also known as “Madameâ€.
Sabejon was in the top 10 drug personalities watchlist in their town, according to PO1 Jayson Sentino of Clarin Police Station.
Sentino said they got an intelligence information that Sabejon allegedly incurred an accumulation of delinquency in the remittance of the proceeds due her supplier of shabu.
Investigators still continue tracing, though, the identity of Sabejon’s so-called shabu supplier who could be the mastermind in her murder at around 1 p.m. on July 11.
The 42-year-old victim was on her way home to sitio Lagsing, barangay Bacani in Clarin on board her motorcycle when the riding in tandem positioned parallel to her on the road.
The backrider then shot her upon gaining vantage point.
Sabejon lost control on the wheels and crashed on the road.
The gunman got off the motorcycle and went closer to her and shot her again.
Sabejon still managed to got up and ran towards a Ken-Ken bus parked by the roadside to unload passengers.
She hurriedly boarded the bus to ask for help, but the riding in tandem pursued her and the gunman fired the last shot on her head while inside the bus.
Sabejon sustained five gunshot wounds, one in the head that finished her off.
Witnesses saw the riding in tandem (both men with cloth covering their faces) fleeing towards the Sagbayan direction.
According to Clarin police investigators, the Oplan Tok-hang team in their barangay had just approached Sabejon on July 8, or three days earlier, to yield to the police. However, Sabejon refused.
According to Sentino, they had monitored that Sabejon was also hooked in drugs, making her both a pusher and a user, which could be the reason she incurred delinquency in the illegal drugs trade.
The police said her husband was aware of her involvement in the illegal drugs trade, but could only do so much since he is away, working abroad.
Dugang ni PO1 sentino nga sa tanang nalambigit sa illegal nga droga sa lungsod sa clarin bugtong ang biktimang si alyas madame lang ang babae nga dunay ka-isog ug walay kahadlok sa paghimo ug illegal nga binuhatan.
LEGIT KILL
For the legit kill, a suspected gun-for-hired was killed during a police operation at around 1:30 a.m. yesterday in barangay Catagbacan, Loon.
The Municipal Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Group (MAIDSOTG) of Loon Police Station and the Bohol SWAT Team caught one Conchito Escabas handing a sachet of shabu to a poseur-buyer in exchange for P500.
Escabas allegedly tried to flee as he pulled a gun and shot the cops, prompting the composite police team to fire back.
The police team recovered an unlicensed cal .38 revolver, three 3 live and one fired bullet, another sachet of shabu and the 500-peso bill marked money from Escabas, in addition to the one he handed to the poseur-buyer.
The sachets of shabu had been estimated to weigh 0.15 grams with estimated value of P1,770.
Escabas, a resident of barangay Nahawan in Clarin, turned out to be one of the suspects in the murder of Sabejon.
SHADOW OPERATION
In May 2014, top shabu runner of a slain drug lord’s web, then Clarin’s no. 1 drug personality yielded two large packs of shabu in a recent, enough for a non-bailable case.
PSInsp. Roland Desiree Lavisto, then the chief of the Provincial Public Safety Company- -also leading then the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team, identified the arrested drug personality in Clarin as Pablo Ompad.
Lavisto’s team arrested the 42-year-old suspect in a raid in barangay Nahawan wherein the packs of shabu confiscated during the operation later turned out to have weighed at least 16 grams.
Connecting the dots, the police intelligence assets traced Ompad’s link to the slain Carlito Bunado—an alleged drug lord gunned down early dawn on April 16, 2014 while travelling along M. Torralba St. on his way home after collecting the day’s proceeds from drugs and gambling which he operated inside the city carnival put up at that time for the city fiesta.
During the raid at around 11 p.m. on May 14, 2014, Lavisto’s team recovered two large packs of shabu and drug paraphernalia inside Ompad’s room, and a caliber .38 revolver with five live bullets inside another room occupied by his 50-year-old brother, William.
The PPSC/SWAT team conducted the raid based on a search warrant issued by Judge Suceso Arcamo of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 47.
Authorities detained the Ompad brothers in the lock-up jail of Camp Dagohopy in Tagbilaran City.
An investigation on the two suspicious personalities in barangay Taloto and barangay Cogon of this city led to Ompad’s link to Bunado’s drug web.
The two suspicious men allegedly displayed high-powered firearms in front of neighbors in barangay Cogon three days prior to the Clarin raid, prompting a team from the Tagbilaran City Police to respond and arrest them.
Then criminal investigator, SPO4 Edgardo Chan, of the Tagbilaran City Police identified one of them as Antioco Cuizon, 25, single and a resident of barangay Taloto.
Police identified Cuizon’s company as one Franklin Degamo, 29, single, who hailed from barangay Nahawan, Clarin and was temporarily residing at San Jose St. in barangay Cogon of this city.
Chan’s team confiscated a KG 99 automatic rifle with a magazine loaded with caliber. 45 ammunitions from Cuizon, and a Clock caliber. 40 pistol with four live ammunitions from Degamo.
They had been charged of violations of Republic Act 10591 or The Comprehensive Firearms and Ammunition Regulation Act against the two before the City Prosecutor’s Office.
In the course of investigation, the police found out that Cuizon and Degamo had worked for people linked to Ompad’s hired executioners also linked to Bunado.
Bunado had been placed in the order of battle for being elusive despite the tight surveillance on his involvement in the illegal drugs trade.
In fact, the Provincial Intelligence Branch was about to apply for a search warrant on him in 2012. But by the time the police team had composed themselves, Bunado suddenly became less visible in Talibon.
In the subsequent surveillance operations, the police found out that he had transferred his operation to other towns like Carmen.
Bunado had allegedly turned to the illegal drugs trade after he got out of the New Bilibid Penitentiary in Muntinlupa in 1998 after serving nine years in prison for a murder case.