BACOLOD City – Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran commended the Bacolod City Police Office (BCPO) for neutralizing one of city’s top drug suspects.
Ramy Poja – the suspected leader of the Poja drug group and the No. 1 most wanted person of Police Station 3 – was killed in a gunfight with police officers in Barangay Banago on Thursday.
BCPO operatives found Poja and two companions – Roberto Lim and Rusty Constantino – inside the house of Salvador Poja at around 4:20 p.m. that day.
The police officers were out to arrest the three after an encounter that injured an officer at 1:30 a.m. on the same day, a report from the Police Regional Office 6 showed.
The officers negotiated for their surrender but the three fired at them. Lim was also killed in the shootout while Constantino was injured.
Poja’s girlfriend Claudine Bindol and Cyril Jarina were also arrested.
According to Familiaran, authorities – including the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency – have attempted to arrest Poja many times but the latter always managed to evade them.
This time, the BCPO did a “job well done,” Familiaran said.
Poja’s neutralization must make other drug suspects in the city to “think twice” now, the vice mayor added.
Familiaran said he hopes that those arrested after the gunfight will help the police catch other drug suspects in the city, especially the “sources.”
Familiaran hopes that Poja’s death will temporarily make illegal drug activities in the city less rampant.
While the neutralization is a “big achievement” for the police, Familiaran said the help of the public still matters./PN
