ILOILO – The 15-year-old boy who initially tagged three people in the rape-slay of a 19-year-old college student in Barangay Abangay, Janiuay town retracted his statement.
He has now tagged his father as the real culprit, according to Police Captain Dadjie Delima, Janiuay police chief.
Following the boy’s latest statement, the Janiuay police released Grade 10 student Reymart Estoque, 18, of Barangay Canawili, Janiuay.
On Sunday, the Janiuay police took custody of the boy and Estoque who had denied raping and killing Ronalyn Bravio on Saturday.
The boy’s father was arrested yesterday morning and detained at the Janiuay police station. He confessed to the crime after initially denying it, according to Delima.
“He told me he did it because he was obsessed with the girl,” said the Janiuay police chief.
The police would have wanted a drug test but the suspect, who was not in the Janiuay police’s watch list of suspected drug personalities, refused.
The 42-year-old Rhegie Lavoit Sr., the suspect, asked forgiveness for what he did, added the police chief.
Lavoit and Bravio were second cousins.
“Ngaa gin patay mo gid si Inday nga imo man lang pakaduha? Gin guba mo handum namon sa amon bata,” Bravio’s mother Erma told Lavoit at the Janiuay police station.
Bravio, a student at Central Philippine University, was found dead in a rice field at around 6:50 p.m. on Saturday. She was naked and had a stab wound in the abdomen and bruises on her forehead, right eye and neck.
An autopsy confirmed that Bravio was raped and the cause of death was a fractured skull that damaged her brain.
“Dapat sa imo patyon paagi sa pagbitay,” Erma told Lavoit, a farmer separated from his wife for eight years now.
According to the mother, Lavoit tried to enter her daughter’s room last year but was caught by another daughter.
Delima said a complaint for rape with homicide would be filed against Lavoit and his son would be made a state witness.
The boy told the Janiuay police he and his father chanced upon Bravio walking home around 6 p.m.
His father forcibly took Bravio to the rice field, he said, and also forced him to rape the victim.
“Ang una ko nga statement gintudlo ni Papa nga ihambal ko nga si Estoque naghimo, kag indi siya pag-i-mention,” the boy told Delima.
The boy was turned over to the Municipal Social Welfare and Development Office./PN
