NPA confiscate 15 guns of retired cop in Kidapawan raid

KIDAPAWAN CITY --- Rebels have claimed responsibility for Thursday’s seizure here of 15 firearms from a former barangay chairman by guerillas disguised as personnel of the National Bureau of Investigation.The New People’s Army on Friday told reporters via email that guerillas carrying copied NBI identification cards were behind the attack on the house here of Reinando Denampo.Denampo is a former chairman of Barangay Tagbak in Magpet town in North Cotabato.Probers have confirmed that Denampo lost four 5.56 caliber Bushmaster assault rifles, two 7.62 caliber M14 rifles, an M-203 rifle fitted with a 40 millimeter grenade launcher, a 5.56 caliber Ultimax rifle, a combat shotgun, a 9 millimeter KG9 machine pistol and four .45 caliber pistols to the NPAs.The NPA also claimed that the confiscation of Denampo’s firearms was in retaliation for his being supportive of the military’s abusive pacification campaign in Magpet while he was chairman of Barangay Tagbak , an interior agricultural enclave there.The NPA’s statement emailed to selected print and broadcast journalists was signed by Rigoberto Sanchez, spokesman of the group’s self-styled Southern Mindanao Guerilla Front.Responding police investigators said the rebels who raided Denampo’s house cuffed him and his wife after they barged into its living room and immediately escaped using a Toyota Fortuner parked nearby after divesting them of their belongings.The group also carted away the couple’s laptop computer, mobile phones, wallets, wristwatches and jewelry kept in a box hidden in their bedroom.Denampo is a retired policeman who served as chairman of Barangay Tagbak for two consecutive terms after his retirement from the police service.Tagbak is a secluded agricultural area in Magpet, about 45 minutes away via overland travel from Kidapawan City, the capital of North Cotabato.The NPA and the military figured in more than a dozen encounters in different barangays in Magpet in the past two months.