SECURITY AIDE OF IBP-ABRA PREXY KILLS WOULD-BE BOSS’ MURDERER

February 3, 2023 Headlines

BANGUED, Abra

A security aide of Integrated Bar of the Philippines-Abra chapter president Hamilcar Palaran
Bigornia killed a would-be murderer of his boss right inside their office Sunday morning at Rizal street, Zone 7, Bangued, Abra. In what could have been this year’s first bloody attack against a lawyer in that province and highland Cordillera, Atty. Bigornia’s security aide Ruben Barcena
Alvarez, 44, from Brgy. San Isidro, Lagangilang, shot and killed 34 year old vendor JR Beljamin Bergonia, who stabbed the lawyer and his security aide.

Alvarez, the Cordillera police said, was able to draw his firearm and killed JR Bergonia but the latter’s younger brother 26 year old Jhenmark Bergonia, also from Consiliman, Zone 2, Bangued, was able to flee on foot. Before the stabbing melee, the police added, the lawyer were inside his law firm at around 9:30AM when the Bergonia brothers went inside to ask about a release paper
pertaining to a pending case.

The lawyer reportedly asked for the identities of the duo and JR Bergonia answered in Ilokano dialect “Siak ni Nazareno” (I am Nazareno). Sensing danger, Atty. Bigornia asked his security aide to assist the Bergonia brothers out from his office because he knew nothing about any release paper they were referring to. Acting as body cover of the lawyer, security aide Alvarez stood infront of his
boss while Jhenmark Bergonia handed a kitchen knife to JR Bergonia and began stabbing the lawyer and his security aide on different parts of their bodies.

Responding policemen from the Bangued police station were able to catch Jhenmark Bergonia, to face charges, the Cordillera police said, as it vowed it is digging deeper into the attack. Meanwhile, the IBP-Abra chapter condemned the attack as “an incisive and growing impunity against lawyers,
judges and officers of the Court has fostered an overwhelming climate of dread.” It appealed before the police and the NBI “to investigate (the matter) as well as any other unresolved instances that seriously impinge upon the rule of law”.

Artemio A. Dumlao/ABN