Bacolod City police director, Senior Supt. Pedro Merced, yesterday said he will formally ask Camp Crame to authenticate the suspension order to three Bacolod police officers for their alleged involvement in the mauling and disarming of Supt. Demosthenes Fernandez, at the Goldenfields Commercial Complex in Bacolod City on Jan. 11.

Merced also said he has advised SPO3 Romeo Ortega and SPO1s Alfredo Salgado, detailed at Police Precinct 8 and City Mobile Group, respectively, to personally verify the suspension order at Camp Crame.

The suspension order was reportedly handed to Salcedo by the secretary of the legal counsel of Fernandez in March, Merced added. It was signed by Police Director Nicolas Pacinos Jr, PNP director for Personnel and Record Management in Camp Crame and ordered the 180-day suspension of Salgado, Salcedo, Ortega, Insp. Jomarie Occena and PO2 Leo Poral, both members of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, for grave misconduct, Aksyon-Radyo yesterday reported. The suspension took effect on Feb. 16 and will end Aug. 14, police reports said.

Salgado, 52, who is set to retire on July 31, yesterday said the suspension order is unfair and unjust because they were not even given chance to defend themselves in court. They were not given due process and this has greatly affected his health and his family, Salgado said.

He denied that he, Salcedo and Ortega were involved in the alleged mauling. They were in the police station because they were on-duty police officers when Senior Supt. Lazaro Torcita, then Western Visayas PDEA chief, Occeno and Poral brought Fernandez at the Police Precinct 8, he added. Police investigation showed that Fernandez, who claimed to be the intelligence chief of Police Regional Office 7, was under the influence of intoxicating liquor when he accosted Poral who was on a "classified mission" outside the Tonoshi Karaoke at the Goldenfields Commercial Complex in Bacolod.*DMG

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