Top Bicol drug trafficker shot dead in Bulan gunfight

ONE of Bicol region’s 10 most wanted drug traffickers was killed in a shootout with undercover officers in Bulan, Sorsogon, last Monday, Police Regional Office 5 director Brigadier General Anthony S. Alcañeses announced yesterday.

aThe Bicol police director identified the slain suspect as Rodolfo Sumalinog alias ‘Zoma/Olpe,’ a 59-year old dismissed member of the defunct Philippine Constabulary residing in St. Vincent Subdivision in Barangay San Vicente in Bulan municipality.

According to Alcañeses, combined operatives of the Bulan Municipal Police Station, the Sorsogon Provincial Police Intelligence Branch, the 2nd Sorsogon Provincial Mobile Force Company and the PRO5 Regional Intelligence Division-Regional Special Operations Unit were involved in the buy-bust operation which went awry when the suspect started shooting at the lawmen.

He said that the suspect had just handed a heat-sealed plastic sachet containing shabu to an undercover officer when he sensed the ongoing entrapment operation and immediately drew a concealed firearm and fired at the poseur but missed.

“The suspect is a known big-time drug personality operating in the provinces of Sorsogon and Masbate,” the PRO5 director said.

Recovered from the possession of the slain suspect were four plastic sachets containing shabu, a plastic sachet containing suspected shabu residue,  a marked P1,000 bill paid to him by the undercover agent and a chamber-loaded caliber .45 pistol with a magazine containing one live ammunition.

Alcañeses commended the operating team led by Major Joel Triñanes, the chief of the Bulan Municipal Police Station for their accomplishment.