Policewoman, soldier-boyfriend busted in illegal firearms sale in Cotabato

COTABATO CITY —A policewoman and her boyfriend, who is an Army corporal, both landed in jail after selling firearms to non-uniformed police agents in an entrapment operation in Pigcawayan town in Cotabato province on Saturday afternoon.

In separate initial statements on Sunday, Bangsamoro police director Brig. Gen. Prexy Tanggawohn and his counterpart in Region 12, Police Brig. Gen. Augustus Placer, identified the suspects as Patrolwoman Irish Emoy and Corporal Jaafar Sabturaon. They are now both in the custody of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region.

Emoy, 28, is under the Regional Personnel Holding and Accounting Section of the Police Regional Office-12 while the 33-year-old Sabturaon is assigned at the civil-military operations office of the Army’s 1st Brigade Combat Team based in Pigcawayan, Cotabato.

Police Lt. Col. Ariel Huesca, regional chief of CIDG-BAR, said on Sunday that Emoy and Sabturaon were immediately frisked and cuffed by his non-uniformed subordinates after selling to them a .45 caliber pistol and a 5.56 MM M16 assault rifle for P100,000 in a tradeoff in Barangay Tubon in Pigcawayan.

Pigcawayan, located in the first district of Cotabato in Region 12, is less than 30 kilometers north of Cotabato City, the capital of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim and where the regional office of CIDG-BAR is located.

Huesca, in a report to Tanggawohn and Placer, said the entrapment operation that resulted in the arrest of Emoy and Sabturaon was assisted by the Pigcawayan Municipal Police Station and other units under Cotabato provincial police director Col. Gilbert Tuzon.

Tanggawohn said the CIDG-BAR shall prosecute Emoy and Sabturaon for violation of the Republic Act 10591 that prohibits possession, or sale of firearms, ammunition and explosives without written permit from the Philippine National Police.