Hunt on against 'partner' of Palawan broadcaster's killer

(Updated 1:50 p.m.) Police have started a hunt for a second suspect supposedly hired to kill Palawan broadcaster Gerardo Ortega, even as the arrested gunman admitted being offered P150, 000 for the job. A report by radio dzBB's Palawan affiliate Tuesday said the arrested gunman, Marlon de Camata (a.k.a. Marvin Alcaraz), identified his companion as one Dennis Aranas. The report said police have also invited for questioning a lawyer to whom the cal-.45 pistol used by De Camata was registered. Police initially withheld the lawyer's name but later identified him as Romeo Seratubias, former Palawan provincial administrator. Quoting initial investigation, Superintendent Rolando Amurao, chief of police of Puerto Princesa City, said that Seratubias has denied any involvement in the killing of Ortega. Amurao said Seratubias told NBI (National Bureau of Investigation) probers that he had sold the gun long before the incident happened. It was not immediately clear to whom Seratubias sold his gun and how it ended in the hands of De Camata. Ortega was gunned down in Puerto Princesa City Monday morning. James Viernes, radio anchor of RGMA, said the incident occurred at an "ukay-ukay" or used clothing store along the national highway in barangay San Pedro around 9:30 a.m. Monday, shortly after the radio program of Ortega. Ortega, 47, was the main news anchor and commentator of Radyo Mo Nationwide's (RMN)'s Palawan station dwAR at the time of the killing. Ortega is the 142nd media worker to be killed since the end of the Marcos dictatorship in 1986. The National Union of Journalists in the Philippines said that if it is proven that the killing is work-related, he would be the second journalist to be murdered during President Benigno Aquino III's administration. The first was radio reporter Miguel Belen of Iriga, Camarines Sur, the NUJP said. Puerto Princesa City Mayor Edward Hagedorn, who suspects the killing may be due to Ortega's hard-hitting stance against mining, ordered police to protect Ortega's family as well as De Camata's. On the other hand, investigators also said they are still trying to find from De Camata who ordered the killing as of early Tuesday. De Camata, who was arrested shortly after gunning down Ortega, told police he was offered P150,000 for the kill job, but was able to collect P20,000 so far. He said he and Aranas had been approached in Quezon province by a certain Jun-jun Bumar and one Armando Deloria, who told them they were to kill someone. Investigators said De Camata and Aranas were to meet up north of the Puerto Princesa City after the shooting, then escape. But they said De Camata may have been confused by the commotion — and the public address system of local firefighters calling on the public to help barricade the area — and fled in a different direction and was eventually caught. At the time, he had already thrown the pistol into a trash bin and had changed his shirt. — LBG/RSJ, GMANews.TV