2 shabu peddlers killed in Mindanao gunbattle

TWO heavily-armed drug traffickers in Mindanao were killed in a shootout with agents of the Philippine National Police Drug Enforcement Group (PNP-DEG) in a gunbattle which marred the conduct of a buy-bust operation in Malabang, Lanao del Sur yesterday morning, PNP-DEG director, Brigadier General Romeo M. Caramat Jr. said.

In a report to PNP chief, General Archie Francisco F. Gamboa, the official said that suspects Abdilah Mamaco alias ‘Jonah’ and Mark Samporna alias ‘Marco’ traded shots with officers in Barangay Matalin in Malabang municipality after they apparently sensed they were dealing with an undercover agent around 9:30 a.m. yesterday.

Caramat said that recovered from the possession of the slain suspects were three plastic packets each containing 500 grams of shabu or a total of 1.5 kilograms worth P10.2 million, a chamber-loaded caliber .45 pistol and a fragmentation grenade.

Caramat said that his men were backed up by members of the Malabang Municipal Police Station, the Lanao del Sur Provincial Police Mobile Force Company and the Marine Battalion Landing Team 5 in the conduct of the anti-narcotics operation in the area.

“Both apparently sensed the buy-bust operation and one of them tried to shoot the undercover PDEG agent but missed. Back-up operatives returned fire killing both on the spot,” the official said.

Caramat described the two slain suspects as ‘high-value targets’ in Lanao del Sur and other parts of Mindanao who have long been the target of the police and the military.