Photo of suspect in Campbell slay released

While it awaits the final results of examinations on the victim's remains, the Philippine National Police (PNP) on Tuesday released a photograph of the principal suspect in the killing of US Peace Corps volunteer Julia Campbell. Chief Superintendent Raul Gonzales, director of PNP Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), said they made available to the public the identity of suspect Juan Dontongan, a 25-year-old woodcarver seen near Campbell's shallow grave in Ifugao, to force him to surface. Gonzales said Dontongan can clear his name if he is innocent of murdering Campbell. Policemen have failed to find Dontongan at his residences in Banaue and Benguet. "Kung sakali mang wala siyang kinalaman (If he has nothing to do with the crime, then) he can come forward," he said. Dontongan has been described as 5'7" in height, fair complexion, medium-built and of a "strong" body. Interviewed by GMA News in Batad village in Banaue, Dontongan's wife denied that her husband was involved in the slay. Before her death, Campbell was seen stopping by the Dontongan store along the mountain trail to buy a soft drink. As this developed, Gonzales said the CAR police now have in their custody two pairs of pants, a heavy pestle for pounding rice, and a steel rod which they believed can be used as evidence in the case. He said they will be bringing the items to the PNP Crime Laboratory on Wednesday morning. "The scene of the crime operatives (SOCO) are still in the hinterlands, they have the recovered items. We don't want to give it to others to preserve the reliability of the evidence," he said in Filipino. Director General Oscar Calderon, PNP chief, said in an interview earlier in the day that Campbell resisted the attacks of at least two assailants. "We saw indications that Julia fought back. She was athletic and offered stiff resistance. There was an injury on her shoulder, which indicate she was hit with a blunt object. But she likely lost consciousness when she was hit on the head with the object," Calderon said in Filipino during an interview on dzRH radio. Gonzales earlier said they now have not just one but three witnesses in the killing of Campbell. Reports last week said the first witness was a 13-year-old boy who saw a man flee the crime scene at Batad village in Banaue. "The three boys that we have saw the bag of Ms Campbell being carried by an individual," he said in a television interview Monday. Campbell was last seen on April 8 before she went on hiking in Batad village, Banaue town in Ifugao. She was found dead in the same village 10 days later, buried under muddy soil with her foot protruding from the ground. - GMANews.TV