SAN NICOLAS—Despite his vehement denial, Mayor Leoncio Saldivar III of this town is under probe for his possible links with an armed robbery gang operating in the province and in other parts of the country.

Saldivar is suspected to be behind the Alvin Flores Gang that was involved in the robbery of the Rolex shop at the Greenbelt 5 mall in Makati City on October 18 after three of the primary suspects were confirmed to be under his employ.

The same group was tagged as the main suspect in the robbery of the RC Cola office in Pasig City.

Saldivar admitted that the three suspects, two of who have confessed their participation in the Rolex robbery, previously worked under him, though only for a brief period and he said he was unaware of their illegal activities.

One of the suspects, Jose Warlito Rodriguito, alias “Wallet”, 52, a retired Army Scout Ranger, served as a utility worker of the municipal government.

Rodriguito, a native of Barangay San Rafael Centro in San Nicolas, voluntarily surrendered before the investigation by top officials of the police regional and provincial commands started.

Chief Superintendent Ramon Gatan, police regional director, said during the interrogation, Rodriguito admitted his participation in the Makati heist where he acted  as a security look-out of the group.

During the investigation, Rodriguito reportedly revealed his association with Saldivar.

It was Dennis Serquina, arrested on October 31 by joint Pangasinan and Western Police District personnel at his residence in Purok 2, Barangay Aloo in Umingan, who established Rodriguito’s involvement in the Makati heist.

Saldivar admitted that Serquina and another suspect, Armando Domingo who was slain during the Rolex robbery, worked as security guards at his piggery and cattle farms but both quit after three days citing low wages.

The three suspects were tagged as members of the notorious Alvin Flores Gang whose leaders and two members were slain during a pursuit by a team of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) in Cebu late last week.

Rodriguito also revealed that they stayed in a safe house in Bulacan prior to the Greenbelt 5 robbery, and in that heist, the group used three vehicles, namely, a black Isuzu Trooper, a sky-blue Honda City and an ivory-colored Toyota Corolla, all of unknown plate numbers.

Gatan said Rodriguito identified the gang leader as Alvin Flores, allegedly a former waiter, and a certain Joseph as the group’s assistant leader. Other gang members he named are Domingo, Serquina, Jay-ar Saldivar, Roger Carbonnel alias “Mata”, and six others, known only as “Katawan”, “Taba”, “Ka Romy”, “Toling”, “Alvin” and “Boyet”.

While Mayor Saldivar denied any relation with Jay-ar Saldivar, the police intelligence show that Jay-Ar, known to hail from Nueva Ecija, is originally from San Nicolas and is related to the mayor. —LM

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