MURDERER

Trigger are the horrifying ambushes, seizures, torture, deaths and disappearances of at least 32 sabungeros, and successful and failed ambushes of “master agents,” agents, subcontractors, vehicle drivers, farm hands who were accused by the Boss of cheating, theft and other shenanigans.

The missing sabungeros, and the online sabong or e-sabong in general, are problems not confined only to Laguna but they have started to become national issues, with the Department of Justice (DOJ) even thinking of international exposure—crimes against humanitarian law.

This is not far-fetched because thousands of Filipino overseas workers (OFWs) all over the world are struggling with online-based gambling addiction, according to Sen. Migs Zubiri. Their families are suffering with no remittances, no income and no future.

Many were stunned with the revelations of Julie “Dondon” Patidongan, alias “Totoy”, who has made available to the public through personal videos and media interviews in the last few days details on the missing sabungeros which the Philippine National Police and the National Bureau of Investigation, for all their vaunted experience and expertise, failed to determine.

Alias ‘Totoy’ talks

Some of Patidongan’s pasabog and other recent developments:

—More than 100 sabungeros were killed, 34 of them dumped with sandbags in Taal Lake within the Talisay, Batangas area.

—Several sabungeros were kidnapped and tortured from Manila Arena and other sabungans owned or controlled by Charlie “Atong” Ang, the Alpha Male of all the alpha males in the gambling activities in the country.

—Victims were kidnapped by paid cops from their homes in San Pablo City. That’s Laguna and hometown of new Gov. Sol Aragones and also synonymous to the illegal numbers game Jueteng being the hometown too of Aling Charing Magbujos.

—A former judge is active in fixing cases against Atong Ang’s men. Patidongan said he was acquitted in a court case because of the intervention of this retired judge.

—Calamba City Councilor Arvin Manguiat, in an interview with Pinky Webb in Bilyonaryo, reveals at least 3 successful ambushes perpetrated by corrupt Laguna policemen and former cops in Calamba, all in connection with e-sabong. Manguiat himself survived two ambushes in 2019 and 2021.

As this developed, Justice Secretary Boying Remulla said the DOJ has included the names of Charlie Ang and Gretchen Barretto to the list of suspects being investigated on the missing sabungeros, a case frozen for four years and revived now after alias “Totoy” surfaced.

Also, PNP chief General Nicolas Torre announced that months before, when he was chief of the PNP Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, Patidongan was already providing him with information about the missing sabungeros and corruption in high places in the PNP, the judiciary, etc.

Torre acknowledged that Patidongan is under his protective custody and has filed an application to be under the witness protection program of the DOJ. Torre has also confined some 15 police officers to Camp Crame for investigation and “there could be more.”

Forest lands in Siniloan

In the nation’s frenzy about the missing sabungeros, what’s not being discussed is Atong Ang’s “crime” against the environment and small farmer-settlers in Famy-Infanta Road, particularly the side of Siniloan, Laguna.

Atong has leveled thousands of hectares of forest lands in Siniloan, particularly in barangay Magsaysay, near or within the UP Land Grant of Laguna and Quezon, also barangay Kapatalan, up to what they call Kilometer 19 in Llavac, Siniloan, Laguna, for the production and maintenance of fighting cocks. These areas are forest lands to the right of the Famy-Infanta road going to Real, Quezon.

This info is according to the small farmers displaced by this activity—one of them named Samuel— whose small patch of land is near KM 19. Samuel said many of these forest settlers did not receive any compensation from the men of Atong Ang, while those who were paid received only measly amounts.

Alias Totoy should admit the fact that e-sabong would need hundreds of fighting cocks in its operations, and this gambling activity kills not just the roosters, but also their human handlers, bettors, the environment—and thus humanity as a whole.

The mountain has to be destroyed by bulldozers to make way for gambling profits. This makes the perpetrator a murderer of the environment.

The DENR has some explaining to do here, not just the Philippine National Police, the Laguna Provincial Police Office, the Calamba City police office, the Supreme Court and lower courts, the prosecutors—actually the whole government of President Bongbong Marcos and even Duterte police officials.

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