BY RUBY P. SILUBRICO
ILOILO City – Police probers remain in a quandary. Did a soldier of the Armed Forces of the Philippines die of accidental firing or suicide on Tuesday night in Barangay Libot, Calinog, Iloilo?
Colleagues found the body of 23-year-old Private First Class Mervin Ebagat, 23, of Barangay Poblacion, Tapaz, Capiz around 8:30 p.m.
Ebagat belonged to the 3rd Infantry Division of the Philippine Army in Jamindan, Capiz. He had just finished his reconnaissance surveillance squad training when found dead with a gunshot wound on his right jaw in Camp Libot, a former camp of the 61st Infantry Battalion.
He had an M16 armalite rifle.
“We could not yet conclude if it was a case of suicide or of accidental firing,” said Chief Inspector Rogelio Ortigas, Calinog police chief.
Ortigas said since Ebagat was carrying his M16 armalite rifle with its barrel up, he might have accidentally squeezed the trigger.
However, friends of the victim volunteered the information that he had been unusually quiet because of a family problem./PN
