Cop linked to Maguindanao massacre yields
COTABATO CITY – A police officer linked to the Maguindanao massacre voluntarily surrendered to police authorities in Maguindanao after more than 10 years of hiding.
Police officer 1 Ysmael Baraguir of Maguindanao provincial police office was fetched from his village by agents of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (CIDG-BARMM).
Colonel James Gulmatico, CIDG-BARMM chief, said the CIDG took into custody Baraguir based on an arrest warrant issued by Quezon City Judge Jocelyn Solis Reyes for 56 counts of murder.
Gulmatico told reporters that Baraguir earlier sent surrender feelers to authorities about his decision to yield peacefully.
The CIDG chief and his men proceeded to Barangay Linandangan, Pagalungan, Maguindanao where Baraguir and his relatives were waiting at 7 p.m.
Baraguir, who refused to speak to media, is now detained at the CIDG-BARMM custodial facility at PC Hill, Cotabato City.
He will be sent to Manila but the CIDG is awaiting order from Judge Solis-Reyes after the warrant and corresponding report is sent to her sala.
Earlier, two massacre suspects were separately arrested in Maguindanao after the court convicted last month the massacre perpetrators and acquitted others.