Campbell's body shows signs of rape, murder

Police authorities on Thursday raised the possibility that US Peace Corps worker Julia Campbell may have been raped then killed before she was eventually buried in a shallow grave. Senior Superintendent Pedro Ganir, Ifugao provincial police director, also added that investigators have ruled out the robbery angle since Campbell's belongings were allegedly complete. "May palatandaan na siya'y ni-rape (There are evidence that she was raped)," Ganir told GMA News in Ifugao province. He declined, however, to provide further details to support the rape-slay theory. GMA News' Flash Report added that the face of the 40-year-old American volunteer was deformed, a possible sign of foul play. Initial police investigation showed that Campbell was hit with a hard object, the report said. At about 2 p.m. Thursday, Campbell's body was flown on board a Philippine military helicopter from Ifugao to Camp Crame headquarters in Metro Manila. She was supposed to undergo an autopsy examination at the Philippine National Police headquarters, but her remains were instead taken on board a blue Chevrolet van of the US Embassy. As of posting time, the body was at the Loyola Memorial Chapels in Guadalupe, Makati City, where American pathologists will "assist" in the autopsy. Police officials in the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), continued to suspect that a local resident was behind Campbell's alleged murder. However, they declined to say who their prime suspects were and how the alleged rape-murder was carried out. The Cordillera police is now working with at least one witness from the area. Campbell, who left the cosmopolitan life in New York to do humanitarian work in the Philippines two years ago, was last seen in Batad village, Banaue last April 8. She was declared missing on April 11 and was eventually found dead last Wednesday morning in the same village near a creek. Police officials on Thursday denied previous raw information that Campbell was found at the bottom of a ravine. She was buried on what appeared to be a shallow grave, with her lower extremities protruding from the ground. Earlier in the day, police Director Geary Barias, chief of the PNP for Investigation and Detection Management, said probers in Batad village considered homicide as the likely angle. Asked if the PNP officially considers Campbell as a homicide victim, Barias said in a television interview: "That's how the the investigators on the ground, especially the police director of Ifugao City [sees it,] based on visual investigation that was done [on the cadaver]." Barias said the autopsy in Camp Crame would provide a "more conclusive" picture of what happened to Campbell. GMA News' Flash Report said the complete autopsy was expected to last nine days. - GMANews.TV