BACOLOD CITY, Negros Occidental, Philippines – The alleged abduction of three men in Kabankalan City who initially declared were stolen P80,000 after being released was dismissed as a case of misunderstanding, police said.
Kabankalan City Police told DNX that the witnesses who reported the suspected incident to the station only assumed that the alleged victims were being abducted upon seeing they were forcibly being dragged by four men into a silver car.
Police said Joemarie Flores, one of the alleged victims, came to the station and reported that they knew the men who made them ride the car.
Flores reportedly admitted that these people, whose identities were not disclosed, were their companions in playing a cards game in Candoni town which they cheated on, resulting in them collectively earning P80,000.
Police added that the men who dragged Flores and his two friends into the car only persuaded them to return the money and dropped them in Ilog town a few hours later.
Police clarified that this was neither a case of abduction nor robbery.
Camp Montelibano Information Officer Police Corporal Judesses Catalogo said in a press conference on Tuesday that there was no organized criminal group behind the Kabankalan case as the separate alleged cases of abduction in the province— one in Silay and another in Manapla— were not related to each other.
