A suspected big-time drug personality arrested in a Mansasa operations last week denied having implicated any police officer in his drug deals. An eight- man police team from the city police station swooped down on a room of Travellodge along the Mansasa seaside area to serve a warrant of arrest only to stumble on a drug cache. The raid yielded Lynn Bas y Tabuno alias Lennox Bas, the drug suspect and said to be operating in sophisticated fashion. A large volume of prohibited substance believed to be shabu, a Mitsubishi Pajero, eight cell phones a laptop, among others, were part of the paraphernalia seized in the possession of the suspect. He was supposed to be served a warrant of arrest involving an earlier brush with the law also involving drugs. Reports of police complicity surfaced as subsequent authorities investigating the truth behind allegations of Bas which accordingly implicated a police officer as supplier in his drug trade. Bas, however, denied the allegations.

Police reports furnished to Camp Dagohoy from City Police Chief Arcadio Jamora said that Bas has denied implicating any Philippine National Police (PNP) member involved in the illegal activity. Bas also went on to aver that he did not give any statement to the media and to the police authorities when he was interviewed. A local media outlet aired the suspect’s divulged information, which had Camp Dagohoy leadership immediately concerned. Bohol Police Provincial Director Constantino Barot, Jr. immediately instructed police authorities to conduct separate investigations to ferret out the truth of the matter and possibly pinpoint the implicated police officer, if the allegations were true. PSupt. Jamora told Director Barot in a memorandum sent to Camp Dagohoy dated June 14, that they never heard from suspect Lyn [Lennox] Bas during his arrest any such claims. Jamora added that as far as the office was concerned, no police officer has released a statement to any media practitioner regarding the alleged allegation of the suspect. It may also be recalled that a radio reporter of a local radio station, Willie Maestrado, interviewed Police Chief Jamora and asked him to comment on the alleged claim.

In succeeding police investigations, Maestrado could only say that he heard it from another radio reporter in an early morning broadcast on June 13. The media reporter which Maestrado mentioned could not be available for comment to date. Even then, in a radio interview, Jamora himself admitted that he heard of similar allegations in the early 1990s but also denied knowing any in his term. A lady informant in the same radio interview revealed that once, she personally confronted a small time pusher who divulged that her source was a policeman from a different service. As this developed, PSSupt Barot said he has instructed mandatory random drug tests for police officers, clearly considering the alleged reports could also be true. The provincial director has assured that he would continue investigations in case a similar case in the early 1990s could have recurred. (Rey Anthony Chiu)