Muntinlupa mayor orders probe into employee’s slay

ByJaymee T. Gamil
Philippine Daily Inquirer

The Muntinlupa City government condemned the killing of one of its employees around midnight on Tuesday, just meters away from city hall.

Wilfredo Pastrana, 47, of the city assessor’s office, was shot dead at the corner of National Road and Bruger Street in Barangay Putatan, a police report said. Bruger Street is just in front of the Muntinlupa City Hall.

Pastrana was on his way home after having drinks at a videoke bar when a man approached him on foot and shot him several times. The gunman then fled on a white motorcycle driven by a cohort.

Muntinlupa public information officer Tez Navarro noted that Pastrana was “a good man and a hardworking employee” who had been working at the city hall since the administration of former Mayor Ignacio Bunye in the late 1980s.

Navarro expressed doubts that Pastrana’s killing was related to his work as the victim did not hold a sensitive position at the city assessor’s office.

While investigators were looking for a motive behind the crime, Mayor Jaime Fresnedi condemned Pastrana’s killing and ordered the police to immediately submit a progress report.

Fresnedi said the police as well as residents should always be on the alert for motorcyclists who ride in tandem following high-profile killings in the city committed by men on motorcycles.

On May 30, Manila Toll Expressway Systems Inc. assistant traffic supervisor Rodelo Umali was killed by motorcycle-riding men at Filinvest Corporate City in Alabang.

On May 27, former Alex Boncayao Brigade members Romeo “Ka Joey” Dacles and George “Ka George” Acero were shot dead at the Alabang public market by a man who escaped on a black motorcycle.