CJ calls on PNP to arrest Ozamiz judge’s killers

FILE: Chief Justice Teresita L. de Castro (PNA photo)

MANILA – Chief Justice Teresita Leonardo-de Castro called on authorities to leave no stone unturned in investigating the killing of Ozamiz City Executive Judge Edmundo Pintac on Monday afternoon.

“I’m calling on the Philippine National Police to exert all means and efforts to apprehend the perpetrators at the soonest possible time. I have also instructed the court administrator to coordinate with all law enforcement officers to bring to justice those responsible for this crime. Our prayers and sympathies go out to the family of Judge Pintac. May they find strength in this moment of grief,” de Castro said in a statement, hours after the ambush in Purok 2-B Brgy. Banadero, Ozamiz City by four armed men on board motorcycles.

Supt. Surki Sereñas, police regional spokesperson, said Judge Edmundo Pintac, Pintac was shot to death at around 4:20 p.m.

Photos posted on social media showed the bloodied Pintac slumped on the driver’s seat of his vehicle.

Senior Superintendent Emmanuel Hebron, Misamis Occidental provincial police director, said they are still investigating the motive of the killing.

Pintac was one of the magistrates handling the cases involving the Parojinog drug cartel particularly against Vice Mayor Nova Princess and her brother Reynaldo Parojinog.

In August last year, Pintac denied a plea by the Parojinog children for furlough that will allow them to attend the funeral of their parents, then Ozamiz City mayor Reynaldo Parojinog and the latter’s wife Susan, who were killed along with 13 others in a drug raid by police July 30, 2017.