NBI: Bar exam blast suspect may face frustrated murder raps

Anthony Leal Nepomuceno, who surrendered to authorities on Wednesday after being tagged as a prime suspect in the September 26 Bar examinations grenade explosion, may face charges of multiple frustrated and attempted murder. On Wednesday afternoon, National Bureau of Investigation spokesperson Cecilio Zamora said a complaint may be lodged against Nepomuceno on Thursday. It remains unclear, however, whether the complaint will be filed before the Department of Justice for preliminary investigation or before a Manila court already. "The filing of the charges are supposed to be done this afternoon. But we ran out of time because we are preparing a lot of papers. So the charges may be filed tomorrow. These range from multiple frustrated murder and multiple attempted murder," said Zamora in a phone interview with GMANews.TV.

On Wednesday morning, Nepomuceno, a member of the Alpha Phi Omega (APO) fraternity, surrendered to Vice President Jejomar Binay, one of the fraternity's "respected elders," according to Justice Sec. Leila de Lima. The suspect was then turned over to the NBI for questioning. He could not be detained yet because no formal charges have been filed against him. Binay and De Lima said Nepomuceno denied lobbing the grenade, whose explosion injured more than 40 people, including San Sebastian College law student Raissa Laurel who lost her legs. Nepomuceno, a call center agent, graduated from the Manuel L. Quezon University. P1-M bounty The NBI had earlier said a group of businessmen offered a P1-million reward for information leading to the arrest of any suspect in the grenade explosion. On Wednesday, Zamora said the "NBI's National Capital Region Office will study how the reward money will be distributed to the informants who went to the bureau." Aside from the P1-million bounty, there is also a P200,000 reward offered by the Fraternal Order of Utopia, a fraternity based in the Ateneo School of Law. –VVP, GMANews.TV