Police contacts last person with Tan before her death
The Iloilo City Police Office has gotten in touch with a man said to be the last person seen with businesswoman Rose Tan before she was found dead.
Considered the main suspect, the man is Tan’s associate in her lending business.
“The man is said to be the last person who was with the late Rose Tan. But when we called him up, he claimed that he was in Mindanao since Sunday evening,” Senior Supt. Dennis Basngi, city police director, said.
Basngi said the man also claimed he brought his pick-up vehicle to Mindanao, but when the ICPO checked the records of Dumangas wharf on vehicles leaving Iloilo that day, vehicle was not listed in the manifest.
The vehicle in question is supposedly the same one that entered the Queen’s Court Drive-In Hotel the evening of October 10.
Based on the log list, the vehicle entered the motel and occupied Room 138 at around 6:05 p.m. and left at 6:30 p.m.
The motel’s security guard said the vehicle was white contrary to its supposed light silver color.
Investigators said the motel’s guard might have mistaken silver to white because it was already dark.
Basngi said what they have are circumstantial evidences.
“For now, this is the lead that we are following,” he said, adding that they found no reason for Tan’s family member to be involved in her death.
“We saw no direct link. Our investigation instead suggested that someone very familiar with Mrs. Tan’s way of life did it,” the ICPO chief said.
Earlier, the Task Force Rose, created to probe the death of Tan, 69, and her secretary Ma. Purification Catoera of Leon, Iloilo, also searched the victim’s house in Doña Aurora Subdivision, City Proper for clues but they found nothing.
Tan’s body was found morning of October 13 at Room 138 of Queen’s Court Drive-In Hotel in Mandurriao district while Catoera’s body was found a day earlier inside a sack by the roadside of Brgy. Dacutan. Dumangas, Iloilo.
Autopsy results show the two women died of manual strangulation.*
