MARKING his 60th day in office Philippine National Police chief General Camilo Pancratius P. Cascolan yesterday announced the big gains of the force in fighting criminality and keeping peace and order nationwide amid the pandemic.
He said that restricted movement during the community quarantine have resulted in a noticeable fluctuation of crime trends in September and October as Metro Manila and other parts of the country transitioned to General Community Quarantine and Modified General Community Quarantine status.
Gen. Cascolan said the decline in crime trend was more noticeable among the 8-Focus Crimes of murder, homicide, physical injury, robbery, theft, carnapping of motor vehicles, carnapping of motorcycles and rape which comprise roughly 24 percent of the total crime volume over a 60-day period since September.
According to him, the 9-month crime trend recorded from January to September further dipped sharply towards the end of October with more notable decrease in index crimes.
The top cop attributed it to the PNP’s stepped-up campaign against illegal drugs and other forms of criminality while launching a massive crackdown on motorcycle-riding criminals involved in robbery-holdup and gun-for-hire activities.
Gen. Cascolan said that official PNP records show that from July 2016 to last month, the PNP conducted 234,036 anti-criminality operations which led in the arrest of 357,069 suspects; the killing of 7,987 armed suspects during gunbattles; and the surrender of 1,290,768.
He also cited an anti-illegal drug operations in Bacoor City in Cavite last October 25 in which his men seized 8.5 kilograms of shabu worth nearly P58 million.
The top cop said that majority of illegal drugs under the safekeeping of the PNP Crime Laboratory have been destroyed thru incineration following their coordination with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency and the National Prosecution Service.
The PNP chief said that during the past 60-days, operations spearheaded by agents of the PNP Intelligence Group headed by Brigadier Gen. Edgar S. Monsalve also led in the capture of five hard-core terrorists, all wanted for their involvement in kidnapping-for-ransom and murder activities in Mindanao.
