Murdered Baler judge was in Oro during fiesta

By HUSSEIN MACATORO
Editor

THE regional judge who was assassinated in Baler, Aurora, was from Jasaan town in Misamis Oriental, and he spent time with friends in this city barely a week before his murder.

Lawyer Carlo Antonio Almirante told the Gold Star Daily that he was with Judge Jude Erwin Alaba in Barangay Macasandig, this city, on the eve of the Cagayan de Oro fiesta.

Alaba was shot to death on Tuesday by a lone gunman on a motorcycle in front of the 91st branch of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 91 in Baler, Aurora. The judge was shot six times while he was still inside his car while his wife was grazed by a bullet.

Baler councilor Pedro Pandus Valenzuela told the Gold Star Daily that investigators were looking into the cases handled by Alaba.

“May mga kaso siyang hawak sa illegal logging at parang sa mga baril din, plus yung sa kaso ng NPA na naka patay ng mga pulis Ay napa walang sala. So yun yung mga posibilidad,” Valenzuela said.

An official from another Aurora town said the judge was also hearing an illegal drug case. Almirante recalled that he was seated right beside the judge in a house in Barangay Macasandig just last week. The judge apparently came over in time for Cagayan de Oro’s celebration of the feast of St. Augustine, the predominantly Roman Catholic city’s patron saint.

Almirante said he and Alaba had a good laugh the whole night after a meeting with some of their friends.  He said that when he excused himself because he needed to go home, he and Alaba stood outside a gate for 10 another minutes while they waited for the judge’s brother to fetch him. He remembered the judge giving him an advice.

“I never thought that would be the last time I’ll see this great man,” reads a Facebook post by Almirante. He said that when he was informed about the judge’s violent death, he called, and an investigator answered the phone and confirmed that Alaba was killed.

Before becoming a judge, Alaba worked with Almirante for six years in Congress. Almirante said it was Alaba, whom he called “mentor,” who inspired him to pursue his law studies.

Meanwhile, Sen. Aquilino Martin Pimentel III expressed outrage over what he called as a “senseless broad daylight murder,” and appealed to authorities to prioritize the case.

Pimentel, chairman of the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights, said the judiciary has no resources to combat violence against its members that it has to depend on the police and other law enforcement agencies to bring to justice the killer of Alaba, and the “brains” behind the assassination.

He said the impunity that characterized the killing of Alaba raised suspicions that there was a “mastermind.” Pimentel asked authorities to act swiftly and look into all possible angles on “why a well-loved judge would be wasted gangland style right before the doorsteps of his court where he was about to hear cases.”

He said the judge’s wife should be placed under witness protection. Pimentel said the first step to justice is solving the crime by identifying the suspect and arresting him. He noted that the brutal killing last year of Zamboanga Judge Reynerio Estacio Jr., who had handled many controversial cases involving politicians, suspected Abu Sayyaf members and policemen, was still begging for an answer.

Pimentel said arresting the killers would not be enough as he enjoined police investigators to dig deeper to catch the “brains” behind the attack, stop the violence and strengthen public confidence on the justice system.