BACK IN JAIL. Lt. Col. Ariel Pico (right), Bacolod City Police Office (BCPO) public information officer, and Maj. Ruel Culanag, chief of Police Station 3 present the four escapees of BCPO Station 3 during a press conference on Wednesday (Jan. 8, 2020). The four bolted the station’s custodial facility early Monday but surrendered one by one from Tuesday afternoon to Wednesday morning. (Screenshot from BCPO Police Community Relations video)
BACOLOD CITY -- The four detainees of the Bacolod City Police Office (BCPO) Station 3 who escaped on Monday have separately turned themselves in, two days after they bolted the station’s custodial facility.
After their return to jail, they were presented by Lt. Col. Ariel Pico, BCPO public information officer, and Maj. Ruel Culanag, chief of Police Station 3, in a press conference on Wednesday morning.
“Now that they are back, it will be to their advantage. (Their surrender) will serve as a mitigating circumstance. If they did not surrender, it would mean they are guilty. They can still defend themselves since they have not been convicted yet,” Pico said.
The four detainees were Sunny Capa, 22; Ely Lawrence Sazon, 20; Michael Peñoso, 25; and Jeffrey Elangos, 38, who escaped at about 12:45 a.m. on Monday.
On Tuesday afternoon, Sazon was the first to surrender through the assistance of Radyo Bandera Sweet FM Bacolod. In the evening, Capa yielded to the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group - Negros Occidental while Peñoso turned himself in through Bombo Radyo Bacolod.
At dawn on Wednesday, Elangos surrendered to Lt. Col. Ariel Artillero at the BCPO headquarters.
Capa and Sazon, who were arrested in a PHP9.1-million shabu buy-bust in Barangay Banago on Dec. 21, 2019, stayed at home in the same village while Peñoso, also a drug detainee, went to San Enrique town in southern Negros.
Elangos, who is facing a child abuse case, went home to his family in neighboring Pontevedra town. It was the second time he escaped since December, but he was immediately apprehended after his first attempt last month.
The detainees said not a single police officer was around when they bolted the jail, Culanag said.
The detainees cut off one of the steel bars of the cell using a saw to escape. On Tuesday, the station fortified the cell by adding more steel bars.
Duty jailer, Staff Sgt. Eric Olverio, and desk officer, Corporal Orwayne Jade Nadado, have been charged with infidelity in the custody of prisoners under Article 223, Section 1, Chapter 5 of the Revised Penal Code.
The two are also facing administrative investigation along with Culanag, station deputy and desk supervisor Lt. Vergel Valdepeña, and other station personnel. (PNA)
