Guards foil delivery of shabu to jailbird

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet -- Prison guards of the Benguet provincial jail here foiled an attempted smuggling of an inmate’s “shabu.”

Dhabu with paraphernalia was delivered by the prisoner's common law wife, said Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency-Cordillera spokesperson Emily Fama.

Concealed in a carefully packed lunch, the illegal drug was in a heat-sealed, transparent, plastic sachet, containing a lighter and another smaller, heat-sealed sachet which contains two small rolls of aluminum foil, and another sachet of approximately .20 grams of shabu.

To avoid detection, the shabu was topped with cooked rice, viand and was attempted to be smuggled before noon on Oct. 8, said Fama.

Prison Guard AnjoeloBuyagan, one of the two jail officers on duty, noticed that the illegal substance was packed together with bananas, towel, underwear and toiletries, all stuffed in a paper bag.

According to the PDEA, the seized drugs cost P1,500.

The wife hurriedly left the jail when the illegal items were discovered.

PDEA filed violations of Republic Act 9165 (The Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002), specifically Delivery of Dangerous Drugs and Delivery of Drug Paraphernalia against the prisoner's common law wife.

Fama said the “smuggler’s” common law husband, the consignee of the package, has been in jail since October 5 for cases of alarm and scandal, grave threats, and frustrated murder.

Refusing to identify the inmate, PDEA said the prisoner had served in the past as a confidential informant to anti-narcotic operatives, but engaged lately in pick-pocketing and snatching.

In Baguio City, a barangay tanod was nabbed in a buy-bust operation at a parking lot in Barangay Governor Pack Road, here also on October 8.

Joseph Arellano, 47, a native of Magsingal, Ilocos Sur but was living at the barangay hall along Gov. Park Road was entrapped by agents of the Special Operations unit- Regional Anti-Illegal Drug Special Operations Task Group of the PNP-Cordillera in coordination with the PDEA.

Found from the suspect was one transparent heat sealed plastic sachet containing white crystalline substance suspected to be methamphetamine hydrochloride or shabu weighing approximately 0.5 and estimated to have street value of P1,000.