Maguindanao massacre: Newsman's skull shattered, court told

The impact of the bullet that hit Napoleon Salaysay, one of the journalists killed in the grisly Maguindanao massacre, was so powerful that it shattered his skull, a witness told the Quezon City court hearing the case Thursday. Senior Inspector Felino Brunia Jr., a medico-legal expert from the Philippine National Police (PNP) Crime Laboratory, said the bullet that hit Salaysay, a Cotabato City-based journalist, resulted in a “comminuted fracture," meaning part of the skull was “reduced to small fragments." Salaysay sustained six gunshot wounds, some of them in his lower extremities, including thighs, according to Brunia, who autopsied 14 of the 57 victims from Nov. 25 to 26, 2009, in Koronadal City. Brunia said only a high-powered firearm could produce such physical damage to a person. During Thursday’s hearing on the multiple murder case on the accused, among them members of the Ampatuan clan, Brunia also discussed his autopsy report on the remains of Anthony Ridao, who sustained six gunshot wounds, all of them fatal. Ridao, a government employee, was not part of the group of people that was targeted in the massacre, but was only trailing the convoy on his way to Cotabato City when it was gunned down by armed men believed to be members of the Ampatuan clan’s private army. The convoy was on its way to Shariff Aguak to file the certificate of candidacy of then Buluan vice mayor and now Maguindanao Governor Esmael “Toto" Mangudadatu, a member of the Ampatuans’ rival clan. As of posting time, Brunia was discussing his autopsy report on Mangudadatu’s cousin, Meriam Calimbol, who sustained several gunshot wounds including one that entered her nose and exited through the left rear side of her head. A total of 197 persons are currently facing charges of multiple murder, including Andal Ampatuan Sr., the patriarch of the Ampatuan clan, and some of his sons. — Mark D. Merueñas/KBK/MRT, GMA News