The suspect, PO2 Allan Verania, was reporting for work at the National Capital Region-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (NCR-CIDG) in Camp Crame when arrested by his superiors.
Verania did not resist arrest but denied participation in Chan‘s kidnap-slay.
Verania’s superiors turned him over to the Police Anti-Crime Emergency Response (PACER) to join PO1s Candido Vallejo, Roger Villarente and Roger Palana.
"Four down, eight more to go," said a police official referring to the "Doce Pares" gang.
Camp Crame sources said Verania was named by Vallejo as among the key players in the kidnapping of Michael Chua Chan, 44, in Project 4, Quezon City on Sept. 15.
Vallejo, Villarente and Palana were arrested by combined elements of the Cainta police, CIDG-Rizal and the Eastern Police District (EPD) for killing one-year-old Erica Charlene Guevarra during a robbery attempt in Cainta town last Sept. 14.
During tactical interrogation, Vallejo broke down and confessed participation in Chan’s kidnapping. He named his companions, which included Verania and PO2 Alex Pangilinan.
Pangilinan, assigned at the Office of the Businessman’s Concern (OBC) of the CIDG, eluded arrest by the police anti-kidnapping agents last week.
However, elements of PACER recovered a red Nissan Sentra in Pangilinan’s residence at Sitio Penafrancia in Antipolo City, which Vallejo claimed as the vehicle used in Chan’s abduction.
Another suspect, PO2 Joel Tapec, believed to be the gang’s mastermind, remains at large. Police are now in the process of unmasking the identities of the six remaining gang members.
Senior Superintendent Freddie Panen, Rizal PNP provincial director, admitted that evidence recovered during the raid at Vallejo’s safehouse in Pasig City revealed only the first names and aliases of the remaining gang members.
"We are trying our best to identify the six other gang members and arrest them," Panen told The Star.
Meanwhile, Metro police chief Director Vidal Querol ordered Chief Superintendent Oscar Valenzuela, director of the Eastern Police District, to dig deeper into the activities of the "Doce Pares" gang, whose members are mostly from the EPD’s district mobile force (DMF).
"They are supposed to be our frontline unit during rallies but it seems that they are somewhere else," said Querol, amid reports that the gang is involved in kidnappings and bigtime robberies.
Querol also tasked Valenzuela to evaluate the performance of the DMF commander and determine why he was not able to discipline his men.
"He should have exercised leadership and supervised his men," he said.
For his part, Valenzuela said the four rogue cops are regularly reporting for work until they were tagged in the payroll robbery involving Fernando Siy, the vice president of a candy factory in Pasig City last month.
Tapec, Palana and Vallejo were charged with robbery with frustrated homicide for Siy’s case. Tapec was out on a P280,000 bail. Vallejo failed to report for work since then while Palana was attending the preliminary hearing of the case.
Valenzuela pointed out that Palana and Villarente were at the DMF office when arrested by his men following the issuance of an arrest for their role in Guevarra’s killing.