La Union Town Drug Fugitive Cornered In Baguio

November 23, 2020 Police Patrol

BAGUIO CITY (November 18, 2020) — Witty but not good enough.
Teofilo Doctoleto Lopez, 25, who escaped his police escorts in Agoo, La Union more than a week ago after he literally “coughed off his freedom”– was cornered at an apartment in barangay Quirino Hill here Tuesday night.
Taking temporary refuge in the city after his November 6 dawn escape, Lopez, also called “Chantal” in the drug world, was caught by a team of Agoo policemen led by Captain Lawrence Ganuelas, PDEA-Baguio City agents led by Intelligence Agent 1 Reinier Tinong, PDEA-Cordillera Land Transport Interdiction Unit, CIDG-Baguio agents and Baguio City policemen at around 7:40PM Tuesday.
Lopez was being escorted for check-up to the La Union Medical Center after he showed symptoms of COVID19 when he removed his mask and coughed several times at the face of Patrolman Ronald Macalino, prompting the police escort to ask the driver of the police vehicle to stop purposely to disinfect.
But Lopez, caught for selling drugs on October 28, jumped off from the police vehicle and fled. “I took a passenger van to Baguio City,” Lopez narrated his escape from La Union. Captain Ganuelas said Regional Trial Court branch 31Judge Romeo Atillo Jr. issued a warrant of arrest for Lopez on Monday prompting them to lose no time in looking for the fugitive.
“This is a product of interoperability of our law enforcers and cross-border operations and intelligence sharing,” PDEA-Cordillera assistant regional director Intelligence Agent V Seymour Sanchez said.
Lopez, Agoo town’s number 4 Most Wanted individual and considered by the Baguio City police station 2 as a “street level drug personality”, is a notorious drug pusher who had also been spuriously using the name of drug enforcement agencies to leverage his illegal trade.
Ilocos region police director Brig. Gen. Rodolfo Azurin Jr. hailed the re-arrest of Lopez as “a victory of the concerted effort of the Agoo town police, PDEA Baguio and CIDG Baguio”.
Artemio A. Dumlao/ABN