COTABATO CITY (MindaNews / 13 Dec) – A big time drug peddler was arrested during an anti-drug operation here Thursday and more than P6-million worth of shabu were seized from him, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) said.
The operation was led by Juvenal Azurin, regional director of PDEA in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (PDEA-ARMM), after suspected drug dealer Mhads Luminog Mamintal agreed to sell one kilo of shabu to a poseur buyer.
“This man is very elusive and always changes his mind on trade off area while peddling illegal drugs obviously to avoid lawmen,” Azurin told reporters.
Mamintal, driver of a habal-habal (motorcycle used as public passenger vehicle) and resident of Barangay Rosary Heights 7, agreed to deliver one kilo of shabu with the hand-off area at a roadside garments store at corner Roman Vilo and Jose Lim streets in this city.
PDEA agents immediately arrested Mamintal after he handed over the stuff to a PDEA undercover agent and took the bag that contained the “boodle money,” actually fake P1,000 bills.
The suspect’s companion, a certain Abdul, managed to escape but left behind the Multicab he was driving.
“I was only used as guide in their transaction,” Mamintal told reporters.
“After our intelligence validation was completed, we conducted this buy-bust,” Azurin said.
“This information was given to us by the community. Once we received that information, we conducted a series of validation. And when we finally had to do the final transaction, [Mamintal] chose it to be downtown,” Azurin said. (Ferdinandh Cabrera / MindaNews)