Alerted by the local police, elements of the Tabaco City police station, Provincial Highway Patrol Team-Albay and the Regional Mobile Force Battalion-5 collared a suspect in robbery and carnapping incidents in Catanduanes who managed to flee aboard the mainland-bound ferry last Saturday, July 27, 2024.
Working with personnel of the Bato municipal police station, Catanduanes Provincial Intelligence Unit and the Catanduanes 2nd Police Mobile Force Company which conducted a hot pursuit operation, the Tabaco police arrested Federico “Kalbo” Garena, a jobless resident of Sta. Elena, Virac, while disembarking from a ferry boat at the Tabaco port in barangay Cormidal, Tabaco City, at 5:25 PM.
His apprehension came 11 hours after he perpetrated the robbery at a sari-sari store in Cabugao, Bato at around 4:10 AM of July 27.
The report said that student Kyle Santos Panti, 22, was lying on a folding bed while attending to their store when a man wearing a gray jacket, shorts and black helmet entered the store and grabbed the money on the table.
Upon seeing the suspect steal the money, she immediately got up and shouted at the suspect to return the money. However, the man continued to flee and boarded a red Honda Click motorcycle without plate number.
Panti chased the suspect and grabbed his clothes while shouting, “Ibalik mo ang imo na an,” but the man pushed her back, causing her to stumble to the ground.
Then her sister, Bridget Mercy Santos, 28, who owns the store, and their mother, Mercy Santos Panti, 50, heard the commotion, went outside and saw the suspect trying to escape.
They managed to grab his jacket and helmet, which the suspect was able to remove. He ran away, leaving behind the motorcycle, the key, a green Vivo 1906 cellphone and a Banco de Oro ATM card.
Responding personnel of the Bato police later found that the suspect unintentionally left open the Facebook app on the cellphone, enabling the authorities to identify its owner as Federico Garena, who was positively identified by the victims to be the one who stole the money amounting to P4,000.
A search of the motorcycle turned up the ID of its owner, one Ian Sorreda Templonuevo, who later that evening reported the theft of his vehicle.
In his belated report to the Virac police, the 26-year-old ARDCI community development officer and resident of Rawis, Virac, said that at around 2 AM of July 27, his red Honda Click motorcycle with plate number 99EZS, engine number JA69E7265631, and chassis number K2VJ0267662 registered in the name of ARCI Credit Corporation, was stolen by an unidentified person whole it was parked at Kuwagos Bar in Calatagan Proper.
He learned of its recovery from his FB friend Bree Mercy, who informed him that it was recovered by the Bato police earlier that morning after it was used by Garena as getaway vehicle in the robbery incident in Cabugao.