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By Nitz Arancon

A GROUP of burglars from Benguet ransacked a pawnshop here and ran off with some P10 million worth of jewelry and about P300 thousand in cash at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Day. It was the biggest single case of burglary ever recorded in the city so far in recent years.

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The burglary irked councilors Roger Abaday and Teodulfo Lao who blamed the crime on police’s “poor intelligence gathering.”

“The fact that the police have not noticed or acted ahead is an indication that there was lack of intelligence information,” said Councilor Abaday, a criminologist.

Police said they have identified the four men behind the burglary at Alson Jewelry and Pawnshop at JR Borja Street near Cogon market.

Authorities said the same group was behind a number of burglaries in Butuan City and elsewhere in the Caraga region.

Insp. Dominador Orate, deputy chief of the Cogon police, said the suspects, who are from Benguet province, barged into the pawnshop via a lodging house called Stay Inn along Yacapin Street. The inn is situated at the back of the pawnshop, separated only by a concrete wall.

Investigators said the burglars used acetylene, liquefied petroleum gas, a hammer and other construction tools to destroy a portion of the wall to get inside the pawnshop. These tools were found by the police.

The burglars worked fast as people were outdoors busy watching or exploding firecrackers during the Jan. 1 revelry, said Orate.

Senior Insp. Ariel Phillip Puntillas, chief of the city police’s Theft and Robbery Section, confirmed that the burglars were from Benguet, and that they managed to flee with pieces of jewelry amounting to some P10 million and some P300 thousand in cash.

Police withheld the names of the suspects.

Puntillas said the suspects were identified using security camera recordings from the pawnshop and Stay Inn where the thieves checked in on Dec. 28, 2013.

He said the burglars left the inn without informing any worker at the establishment.

Councilor Abaday said the burglary meant that the thieves were “smarter than our police” and “this should not be the case.”

He and Lao said the police should become proactive in its law enforcement operations.

Abaday called on Mayor Oscar Moreno to convene the City Peace and Order and Development Council in response to the Alson burglary.

Councilor Lao, for his part, called the police “palpak,” adding that the burglary was proof that its intelligence network “has not been working so well.”

“Supposedly, the police should be resourceful in gathering information,” Lao said.

He said police should tap guards, vendors, hotel receivers, motorela and trisikad drivers,  barangay  tanod, street sweepers and even commercial sex workers, among others, just to get vital information.

Councilor Ramon Tabor however said the intelligence network of the police is “kusog pa gihapon” even as he blamed the management of the inn for not being security conscious.

Tabor, who chairs the city council’s police committee, said the inn did not require the burglars to show their IDs and neither did its workers mind the construction tools the criminals brought inside their room.

He said authorities have asked the public to be on guard against criminals especially during the Christmas and New Year’s Day revelries.

“Prior pa sa holidays toward the new year, nag-advisory na kita sa tanan especially sa mga banks, pawnshops and other establishments, to monitor sa mga lodging houses, rooms for rent, hotels, nga na-ay mag-check in kay ma-o kana ang modus nga while bibo, sakyan sab ni pagpangansack,” said Tabor.

He said it is impossible for the police to keep an eye on all establishments and the entire city.

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