MANILA, Philippines – Home is where a person feels safest.
But not at the Central Park 2 Condominium in Pasay City. On Tuesday, August 29, at about 6 p.m., when many residents were about to take their dinner, a man and a woman were heard arguing on the 14th floor of the 25-story building along D. Jorge Street.
Suspecting that his 30-year-old live-in partner Emelyn Sagun was fooling around, Alberto Garan, 39, lunged a knife at her and dropped her body through the stairway before going on a stabbing spree, killing four more condo residents, including a 12-year-old girl, and hurting four others.
Witnesses said there could have been fewer casualties had the condo’s security guards closely monitored the establishment through closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras installed in the building.
National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Director Oscar Albayalde on Wednesday said investigators found out that no one was assigned to monitor the cameras when the incident took place.
“Unang-una sa CCTV area walang nagbabantay. Inamin nila ‘yon. Hindi nila alam na may nangyayari na. Nalaman lang nila no’ng may commotion na. No’ng nag-iingay na sa labas, doon palang sila tumawag sa PCP (Police Community Precinct), which is few steps away,” Albayalde said.
[In the first place, nobody was guarding the CCTV area. They admitted it. They didn’t know that there was already something happening. They just knew about it when there was already commotion. When there were already people creating noise outside, that was only the time that they asked help from the Police Community Precinct, which is few steps away.]
Albayalde said authorities would look into the possible lapses committed by Central Park Tower 2’s security personnel.
He said that had the guards been more vigilant, they could have saved lives by preventing Garan from rushing around the condo in a murderous frenzy.
“I think if alam nila gagawin nila kaya nilang (pigilan ‘yong suspect) dahil iisa naman ‘yong tao lalo walang baril [I think that if they knew what to do, they could have stopped the suspect because he was just alone and had no gun],” said the NCRPO chief.
Garan attempted to shoot Sagun with a .38-caliber pistol but the gun did not go off and thus attacked his girlfriend with a 14-inch kitchen knife before he was killed by responding policemen.
Senior Inspector Edgar Dimaunahan was relieved following the carnage. He is the commander of the Pasay City Police Community Precinct 5, which has jurisdiction over Central Park 2.
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