MANILA: Police have arrested two suspects and killed one when he tried to escape in a follow-up to a robbery in which 18-year-old Nick Russel Oniot was stabbed 18 times in Taguig City.
“Even if there’s a feeling of satisfaction that the suspects were arrested, it won’t bring back my brother’s life. We’re just glad that there was quick police action, and that’s what happened to the suspect,” Inquirer quoted Nick’s sister Shiela as saying.
Nick, an architecture student from Adamson University, was walking on Oct. 14, at 10:36 p.m., when he was mugged by two people along Martinez Street, several blocks away from his house on Pineda Street, Barangay Central Signal Village, the report said.
A barangay CCTV footage showed that the suspect who tried to grab Nick’s bag was Reynold Clave alias Sakura, resident of Barangay South Signal, who was notorious in the area as a holdup man, Pat Henry Dueñas, barangay chairman of Central Signal, reportedly said.
Clave later pointed to Marvin Bernardo as the one who stabbed Nick 18 times when the student resisted the robbery, said the news portal.
Dueñas reportedly said Bernardo was recently given parole from a murder case that happened sometime in 2000. Bernardo also reportedly killed a fellow inmate while detained at the Taguig City Jail.
“People like that should not be allowed to roam the streets. They shouldn’t be allowed to live. They took away my brother’s right to live. They took away his dreams,” Shiela was quoted as saying.
The Taguig City police declined to release the spot reports on the robbery-stabbing and the gun-grabbing. Shiela reportedly said it was understandable “considering what’s happening in the Senate.”
She was referring to the Senate committee hearing on the alleged extrajudicial killings in the war on drugs.
“Nakakasama ng loob. Ganon ba pinoprotektahan nila, yung ganong klaseng tao, kesa sa kapatid ko na walang ginawang masama (It hurts. Are these the characters the senators want to protect, instead of people like my brother who have done nothing wrong?),” Shiela was quoted as saying by Inquirer.
She reportedly lamented the final moments of Nick, slumped on the pavement in his bloodied uniform, as bystanders did not even bother to check him or call for help.
