Subpoena served on Mayor Baldo over Batocabe slay

The Office of Provincial Prosecutor of Albay has formally asked Daraga Mayor Carlwyn Baldo to answer the charges filed against him in connection with the killing of Ako Bicol party-list Representative Rodel Batocabe and his police aide.

Philippine National Police (PNP) spokesperson Chief Superintendent Benigno Durana Jr. confirmed to GMA News Online on Thursday that a subpoena has already been served to Baldo.

"Yes, it (subpoena) was served yesterday (Wednesday)," he said.

Durana said the subpoena issued by the Office of Provincial Prosecutor of Albay was served by the police's Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Baldo's residence and that it was received by Baldo's mother.

The police filed murder and frustrated murder charges against Baldo last week in connection with the killing of Batocabe and his aide, Senior Police Officer Orlando Diaz, and the wounding of seven others last December.

The police banked heavily on the testimony of Emmanuel Judavar, who used to work for Baldo, that it was the mayor who hired a group of six men  to kill Batocabe for a sum of P5 million.

A day after the police filed the charges against Baldo and six other suspects, the alleged gunman Henry Yuson surrendered to the police and confessed to being the one who executed the hit on Batocabe and Diaz.

Yuson echoed the police's narrative, saying that he did the job for the money but the mayor did not pay them P5 million as promised.

Baldo has denied the charges, saying that he never ordered a death sentence on anybody and that he was just being used as an scapegoat.

Baldo was supposed to face Batocabe in the 2019 polls in the Daraga, Albay mayoral race.  —KBK, GMA News