PDEA busts village official, four others

By Freddie G. Lazaro

TUGUEGARAO CITY -- A village councilman and four others were arrested by a team of police and Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency operatives in separate buy-bust operations in Isabela and Cagayan provinces, recently.

PDEA Region 2 director Juvenal Azurin reported the arrest of Barangay Kagawad Joel Martinez in the village of Magleticia in Echague, Isabela.

“Martinez is a priority target list drug pusher,” said Azurin. “Our troops recovered in his possession the two plastic sachets of crystalline substance believed to be shabu,” he added.

Martinez’s arrest comes two days after PDEA, backed up by police in Cagayan, arrested Greg Neil R. Farin, one of the target list drug pushers in a buy-bust operation on Old Centro Provincial Road, Barangay Centro West, Ballesteros municipality.

Arrested along with Farin was his alleged cohort Nino Gunio, who also yielded five sachets of suspected “shabu.”

“In a follow-up operation, another 15 sachets of shabu was confiscated from the residence of Danny Consol,” said Azurin of the 48-year-old businessman who was earlier arrested in Barangay Caprintero, Tuamuini, Isabela.