2 suspects in ambush of doctor in Maguindanao del Sur surrender to cops

COTABATO CITY — Two of the three suspects in an ambush of a 28-year-old physician in Buluan town in Maguindanao del Sur last February 3 surrendered to the police on Wednesday. 

Brig. Gen. Allan Nobleza, director of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region on Friday said that the two suspects in the near fatal ambush of Sharmaine Ceballos Barroquillo, one of them a minor, agreed to surrender to the Buluan Municipal Police Station through the intercession of relatives and local officials.

Barroquillo, who sustained gunshot wounds in different parts of her body, is still confined in a hospital.

Local leaders told reporters that one of the two suspects now in police custody, the 19-year-old Edzra Espadera Tangcuangan, had confessed that their motive was to rob Barroquillo of her money, jewelry and other valuables, but repeatedly shot her car with pistols instead when they failed to flag her down at a highway in Buluan.

Nobleza and local officials in Buluan asked reporters not to identify in news reports the detained accomplice of Tangcuangan as he/she is still a minor.

Barroquillo, who hails from Polomolok town in South Cotabato, works at the Sultan Kudarat Provincial Hospital in Isulan town in Sultan Kudarat.

She was on her way to somewhere from the town proper of Buluan when she was attacked by Tangcuangan and two others, all armed with handguns.

Nobleza and the director of the Maguindanao del Sur provincial police, Col. Roel Sermese, said policemen and barangay officials are still trying to locate the third suspect who has reportedly fled to another town in the province.