PNP fails to trace owner of guns seized in Rizal raid

Aside from that, the ERs were also returned to Loren Legarda.

The Philippine National Police-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (PNP-CIDG) yesterday said it failed to trace the ownership of the guns seized at the rented house of former National Bureau of Investigation handwriting expert and chief document examiner Segundo Tabayoyong in an early morning raid by operatives of the PNP-CIDG and Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (Isafp) agents staged last week in San Mateo town, Rizal.

Police Supt. Wilben Mayor, CIDG-National Capital Region Intelligence and Investigation Branch chief, said his department found that the .38 caliber revolver and the .9 mm pistol seized from the rented room of Tabayoyong were not registered with the PNP Firearms and Explosives Division.

The alleged failure of the police to trace the owner of the weapons bolstered suspicions that they were “planted.”

The weapons were allegedly found by the authorities along with a lone magazine for a Thompson submachine gun during the raid that was staged last Aug. 17.

Finding nothing irregular in the seized items, the CIDG yesterday afternoon returned the seized 41 bundles ERs and other poll documents that were placed in 13 boxes to the opposition represented by former Sen. Loren Legarda.

Legarda, however, said she was “conditionally receiving” the documents from the CIDG as she raised the possibility that some of the election documents may have been “tampered with or substituted with forgeries” while in the possession of the police and military operatives who took them.

“Just because the CIDG has turned over to us these items, it doesn't mean that that's already the end of the story. The raid was illegal, and the seizure of the documents was illegal. We have to determine first if there are items missing or if alterations were done on the documents while in the possession of the raiders,” she said.

So, peke ba o manufactured yung mga ERs na nakuha nyo sa bahay ni Tabayoyong, ISAFP and CIDG? Dahil sabi ni Makalintal na peke raw ito.

UPDATE: But not everything has been returned:

Raval also claimed the video tapes which proved cheating during the elections last year were missing.

When pressed by reporters whether the video camera and video tapes which Tabayoyong had said were seized from the house were inside the boxes returned to Legarda, Mayor said his team had not taken any cameras or tapes from the residence.

Tabayoyong said the missing video tapes were important because he taped his examination of the election documents while they were taped on the wall of the house.

So why aren't the tapes returned yet, ISAFP?