“My Best Friend is a person who will give me a book I have not read.”
― Abraham Lincoln
Police and other law enforcement officers in Central Luzon are still investigating the case of the missing beauty queen, Geneva Lopez, and her fiance Yitshak Cohen, an Israeli. Geneva is 26 years old while Yitshak is 37.
The couple was last seen in Angeles City on June 21, a Friday, boarding a sports utility vehicle (SUV). They were going to Tarlac City to meet a middleman who was selling a parcel of land, and they were to meet the broker in nearby Capas.
Geneva and Yitshak disappeared and have been reported missing since then. Police investigators reviewed all the CCTV footage that were available showing the car and the couple. After a few days, they found the SUV abandoned and burned in Barangay Cristo Rey, Capas. Inside the car that was partly consumed by fire were personal items that belonged to Geneva, such as her ATM card and an ID photo.
Some relevant facts about Barangay Cristo Rey.
Formerly known as Camp O’Donnell, Cristo Rey used to be a Naval Transmitting Facility by virtue of the 1947 Military Bases Agreement between the Philippines and the United States.
After the Mount Pinatubo eruption (June 1991), President Corazon C. Aquino issued Proclamation No. 813 that reserves portions of the Clark Air Base military reservation located in the municipality of Capas to be the resettlement site for Mt. Pinatubo eruption victims.
Thus, the O’Donnell Resettlement Site (the biggest with a maximum capacity of accommodating 13,000 families) was established and gave refuge to many evacuees and victims of the eruption from different barangays of Concepcion and Capas. The community was divided into 147 blocks representing a cluster of settlers grouped according to their place of origin.
In 2003, the provincial board of Tarlac approved the provincial ordinance creating Barangay Cristo Rey from within the O’Donnell Resettlement Area. It has become a huge community with residential houses and business establishments like the Northern Cup and the country’s largest drug reformatory, the Capas Bahay Pagbabago.
An information from an online source said Barangay Cristo Rey has the most complicated road system in the whole of Tarlac province. This may be the case if one is driving inside the confines of the rural village, with Mount Arayat in the background. But when you ride a plane, or fly a drone, you will discover (and appreciate!) that the place has an eight-side polygon that acts like a rotunda, with a square at the middle. A complete octagonal construction of the streets, which can only be made from a completely barren piece of land like this Clark Air Base military reservation before.
But why was the SUV used by Geneva and her boyfriend Yitshak found in Barangay Cristo Rey? Perhaps the said complicated road system can offer an explanation? With such a local road network where there are large spaces without houses yet, it would be easy to bring a car, leave it there and burn it. Especially at night.
PNP spokesperson Jean Fajardo said the PNP Highway Patrol Group (HPG) went to the address of the registered owned of the vehicle that was abandoned and burned. They learned that the registered owner had sold the car to other people.
While the Israeli embassy in Manila has been notified of the case and is cooperating with the government in solving the case, the Cohen family is offering a P250,000 reward to anyone who can provide information on the missing couple. Joe Cohen, a brother of Yitshak, said they are offering the reward money to help in finding his brother and his girlfriend. Joe said the family’s assumption is that the two are still alive, since they did not receive any information that might suggest that the duo were kidnapped for ransom. Joe appealed to any one who saw them or knows any information about them to help the Cohen family to resolve this case.
Moreover, PNP chief General Rommel Marbil ordered the creation of a special investigation task group (SITG) to focus on the probe on the mysterious disappearance of Geneva and Yitshak.
Details are trickling in
As the days pass, details and more information about the case are coming in in trickles.
Police said there is a third car that was seen moving in convoy with the couple’s vehicle. They traced the movement in Barangay Armenia in Tarlac City, the place where the piece of land for sale is located. The car was also found abandoned in Barangay Tibag in Tarlac City, said Capas PNP chief Lt. Col. Librado Manarang.
According to Fajardo, however, the middleman who was brokering the sale to the couple is a former policeman assigned in Angeles City but was discharged from the service for being AWOL. He now makes a living by selling real estate, or facilitating the sale of land by arranging meetings between the owners and buyers.
Geneva Lopez’s claim to being a beauty queen rests on her being a candidate for the Mutya ng Pilipinas Pampanga 2024, a pageant where she represents Sto. Tomas town, Pampanga. Geneva’s handler and the organizers of the event wondered why she was late for rehearsals, something that the beauty queen was careful not to do.
The search for Geneva and Yitshak continues.
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