Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra said Friday the National Bureau of Investigation had found no foul play in the death of its counter-terrorism division chief this week.
Guevarra said NBI OIC Director Eric Distor had told them that the death of Head Agent Raoul Manguerra was due to “accidental fire” from a gun, but he did not say who fired the gun.
“Foul play, however, appears to be out of the question,” Guevarra said in a message to reporters.
Manguerra died around midnight on Tuesday of a gunshot wound in the abdomen, according to police.
He was rushed to the hospital after his driver and an NBI employee heard a gunshot in his office at the bureau headquarters in Manila.
Guevarra expressed sadness over Manguerra’s death because it happened when the government is going “full blast” in the implementation of the anti-terrorism law.
“It’s just too bad that this happened, this passing away of Attorney Manguerra, but we’ll have to deal with that and we express our deepest sympathies to the family of Attorney Manguerra and we hope that the NBI will be able to proceed with its task of dealing with anti-terrorism in honor of the late Attorney Manguerra,” he said.