Injured	Killed
0	1

Date: 24 December 2010
Source: http://www.sunstar.com.ph/cebu/local-news/watcher-s-body-found-hacked

CEBU CITY – Fishermen and the police on Thursday fished out of the Cordova seas the body of the missing Marine Watch volunteer Rodrigo Sultan.

 

Sultan, who could not be accounted for since Monday after escorting two men caught in the act of illegal fishing, bore hack wounds on his face.

 

He also had a hack wound on his arm, an indication that police said he had parried the blow.

 

He was last seen escorting fishermen Dongcoy Yongco and Luis Fernandez.

 

Police recovered Sultan’s body at 6:45 a.m. at the Kaloking Ledesma islet near the Cordova lighthouse in Barangay Day-as.

 

Cordova Police chief Felix Pacaldo said Yongco and Fernandez were suspects in the killing of Sultan.

 

Sultan had arrested Yongco months back also for illegal fishing. Yongco was fined P2,500.

 

Despite pronouncements by Pacaldo and Cordova Mayor Adelino Sitoy that Marine Watch volunteers are not allowed to carry firearms because they are civilians, Sultan carried with him a .45 pistol, his wife Peregrina said.

 

Marine Watch volunteers keep a shotgun in their pumpboat, their wives said.

 

Seeing Sultan armed could have made fishermen Yongco and Fernandez uneasy and hostile, Peregrina said.

 

Firearm

 

Yongco and Fernandez had turned over a .45 pistol to a tanod (village watchman) shortly after their motorized boat arrived in the shores of Barangay Pooc, Talisay City Tuesday night.

 

They hurriedly left after they turned over the firearm to Nilo Balorio, a village watchman, around 10 p.m., said Pooc barangay captain Dorotheo Emit.

 

“Pre, diha na na nimo, ikaw na bahala,” were reportedly the words of the two upon handing over the handgun to Balorio. 

 

Balorio, also a local fisher, lives in the shoreline of Pooc where his fellow fishermen’s pumpboats usually dock.

 

Balorio called up Emit, who advised him to record his acceptance of the firearm in the blotter at the Barangay Hall.

 

Emit said the handgun was turned over to the Cordova police.
Aid

 

Meanwhile, Talisay City Police Station Chief Henry Biñas visited the wife of Fernandez at their makeshift hut in the coastal area of Pooc last Wednesday afternoon.

 

He appealed to her to help the police locate or to persuade her husband to surrender.

 

Biñas made the same appeal to Yody Yongco, the pumpboat owner.

 

In a related development, Cordova Councilor Lemuel Pogoy said the Council will recommend that allowances of Marine Watch volunteers be increased and that they be insured.

 

A Marine Watch volunteer receives an allowance of P3,000 monthly. If he is a pumpboat operator, he gets P4,500 a month.

 

The Cordova Municipal Government issued financial aid of P10,000 and a sack of rice to Peregrina Sultan, said Pogoy who heads the environment committee. (OCP/GAC/Sun.Star Cebu)