Fugitive police officers in Dacer case ordered arrested

The Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) ordered Thursday the arrest of three fugitive ranking police officers accused in the 2001 murder of public relations man Salvador “Bubby" Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito. Manila RTC Branch 18 Judge Myra V. Garcia-Fernandez said she found probable cause against former Philippine National Police (PNP) Senior Superintendents Michael Ray Aquino and Cesar Mancao, and Senior Police Officer 2 (SPO2) Allan C. Villanueva, and their seventeen co-accused in the Dacer-Corbito double murder case. The Department of Justice earlier said that they will request the extradition of Aquino and Mancao from the United States if the Manila court hearing their case issued the arrest warrants. Aquino and Mancao fled to the US following the 2001 “EDSA 2" people power uprising. Aquino has been detained by US authorities since last year for allegedly conspiring to download classified federal information and transmitting it to opposition politicans in Manila. Mancao was also taken into custody last month by US agents as a “material witness" in Aquino’s case but has since been released.-GMANews.TV