TACLOBAN CITY — Police have filed murder and frustrated murder charges against a soldier tagged as the suspect in a shooting incident in Catarman, Northern Samar that left a young engineer dead and her brother wounded.
The Philippine National Police in Catarman, Northern Samar said the Catarman Municipal Police Station lodged the complaints before the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor following the completion of its investigation into the shooting that occurred in Barangay Dalakit.
The suspect was identified as Sgt. Jerome Lluz Tejero, an active member of the Philippine Army.
Killed in the incident was Karen Grace Corsino Del Valle, 25, a civil engineer assigned at the Department of Public Works and Highways Northern Samar 1st District Engineering Office. She sustained a gunshot wound to the head and was declared dead on arrival at a hospital.
Her brother, Kent John Corsino, 23, was also shot but survived the attack.
The Northern Samar Police Provincial Office said the filing of the case came after investigators established sufficient evidence linking the suspect to the shooting, which authorities said occurred in Barangay Dalakit and triggered a manhunt operation.
Meanwhile, officials have offered a cash reward for information that could lead to the arrest of the suspect.
Sec. Vince Dizon of the Department of Public Works and Highways, and former Northern Samar first district representative Paul Daza have each pledged P100,000, bringing the total reward to P200,000 for credible and actionable information on the suspect’s whereabouts.
Police said the reward aims to encourage individuals who may have reliable information to assist authorities in the immediate arrest of the suspect.
Authorities also assured the public that any information provided will be treated with strict confidentiality to ensure the safety and anonymity of informants.
The provincial police office said it remains committed to exhausting all lawful means to locate and arrest the suspect and ensure justice for the victims and their families.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)
Curing our blindness
THAT gospel episode about Christ curing a man born blind (cfr. Jn 9,1-41) reminds us that given the truth of our faith that we are supposed to live a spiritual and supernatural life with God, we are prone to have some kind of natural, if not infranatural blindness because we fail to enter into the spiritual and supernatural world, and prefer to remain in the natural level of our life.
Because of that, we miss to see many things that are actually proper for us to know and to live by. Our infranatural blindness is worse than our natural blindness because we can even fail to see the natural things of our life. That’s when we are in the state of sin that obviously would have a big effect on how we see and understand even the natural things.
Remember that in the beginning, in the life of our first parents before they fell into sin, they were in the state of original justice. They could see God and the things of God directly.
But since they fell into sin, they lost that state of original justice. And we, being their descendants, would now be born without that state of original justice. In this sense, we can also be said to be born blind. That’s what original sin is all about.
And to cure this blindness, the only way is to go to Christ who clearly said, “I am the light of the world…whoever follows me will have the life of life.” (Jn 8,12) Obviously, the upshot of this consideration is for us to know and love Christ to such an extent that we become like him as we should. In other words, we become “alter Christus” (another Christ).
As “alter Christus,” we should go to the extent when we can echo St. Paul’s words: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So, I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Gal 2,20)
With Christ we would have discernment, able to see the things of the heart of men rather than relying simply on appearance or some worldly trends. With Christ, we would be able to make proper judgments, rather than being judgmental.
We therefore should do everything to become more and more like Christ. We need to know him more by studying his life, meditating on the gospel, and following his exYes, we have all the means for us to truly become “alter Christus.” We have the sources of divine revelation that show us the truth about ourselves. We have the word of God. We have the Church and the sacraments, especially the Holy Eucharist.
We just have to make the necessary adjustments in the way we think, in the way we identify ourselves. It would not be presumptuous, even given our limitations and woundedness, to start thinking that “I am another Christ, ‘alter Christus.’” We just have to try our best, with God’s grace to think and act like Christ.
With Christ we would have the proper understanding of things. We would have a universal outlook, and we can take on anything that can happen to us, whether good or bad, because Christ himself has assumed everything human including to be like sin even if he himself has not committed any sin. “He (God) made him (Christ) to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be the righteousness of God in him.” (2 Cor 5, 21)