The man who killed Alexis Tioseco

Murder and justice—or the lack thereof—are never simple matters. The author turns a clear eye to the case of Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc, investigating the investigators and unearthing the backstories underneath the story

By Patricia Evangelista

The arrested man had the face of a killer. Shifting eyes, tangled hair, cheeks so thin the bones sliced sharp against skin. At the time of his incarceration, he was the father of nine, with one more on the way.

His name is Danilo D. Jomoc, Sr., born forty-seven years ago to a farmer and his wife in Inopacan, Leyte. His education includes several years in Macagoco Elementary School, and not much else. In 1989, he applied for an opening in Agila Gas, a fuel trucking business owned by a man named Leonardo Tioseco.

Jomoc quit in 2005. When he applied again, he listed Tioseco as his character reference. He spelled it “Tioceco.”

Jomoc has been hauling gas for the Tiosecos for more than two decades, and spent the last on Tioseco property with a brood that grew by the year. When Leonardo Tioseco died in 2007, his son Alexis took over, the only one left in the Philippines after the family immigrated to Canada.

At four in the afternoon of September 5, 2009, the man with the face of a killer was arrested for the double murder of Alexis Tioseco and his girlfriend Nika Bohinc.

***

She is called Mina, short for Magdalena.

She has worked for the Tioseco family for more than five years, first for Alexis’ father, in the last months before he died, then for Alexis, the boy she calls her almost-son.

She says she never suspected Criselda. The woman, she said, was a good cleaner.

She keeps a photo of Alexis on the dresser inside her room. He has his arm around her in the photo. She brings the photo to the living room. This is him, she says. This is me.

Conversations with Mina are peppered with stories of Alexis. How, whenever he went to Canada for the holidays, he would call just to wish her Merry Christmas. How he would order enormous pizzas, and would share slices with her even when she lectured him on cholesterol. How whenever he walked into the house with a friend, any of the troop of filmmakers and writers and artists he gathered around himself, he would call her to the front door and introduce her. “Manang, this is Kiri,” he would say. This is Erwin. This is Quark. This is John. This is Pat. And finally, proudly, “Manang, this is Nika.”

***

Filmmaker John Torres first met Nika Bohinc, Editor-in-Chief of the Slovenian film criticism magazine Ekran, at the Rotterdam Film Festival. Although he was with a small group of Filipinos—including Alexis—he spent most of the time on his own. This is what he saw, one day in January: a woman, sitting on a chair, in conversation. John said it was as if her soul was pouring out with her words. He said she was passionate, he said she nearly trembled with it. She wasn’t angry, this tall slim blonde with the black-rimmed glasses. He says he said to himself, God, she’s intense.

He says he saw her first. And then she saw Alexis.

***

He mumbles when he speaks. His fingers pluck at a loose thread on rough black pants.

Jomoc has a secret.

It was 2007. Alexis had just taken over the management of Agila. His people still talk about his rare visits. Alexis was a film critic, a professor, a writer, far more interested in discussing the need for the establishment of a National Film and Sound Archive than the rise in fuel rates and trucking toll fees. He worked from the safe distance of the second floor of his Times Street home, signing checks and passing them to his foreman across a sprawling wood table he had brought up for the precise purpose of signing checks. Once, twice a month, he would drive to the Agila offices in Taguig to handle the work that demanded his presence.

Jomoc had known Alexis since he was fifteen, when his boss was a quiet teenager.

On one of Alexis’ visits to Agila, Jomoc spoke to “Ser Alexis,” asking if he could advance ten thousand from his trucking salary to pay for his eldest’s college tuition. His son was an intelligent boy, Jomoc told the man who listened, looking at him out of Japanese eyes. His boy had a scholarship, but the fund’s release had been delayed. Jomoc promised to pay, and pay soon.

Alexis refused to advance the money. Instead, he offered Jomoc the ten thousand from his own pocket. A gift, said Alexis. Take it.

He asked about the other children. Was there anyone else, any other child with potential? Jomoc spoke of another boy, in elementary school.

What does he like? Bikes? Here, buy him a new bike. Tell him it’s because he’s a smart boy, and that he should study harder.

Jomoc refused the bicycle money. He said his son already had a bike, and that he, Jomoc, couldn’t accept any more.

Alexis insisted; Jomoc resisted. The trucker won.

Alexis said the other employees would not be happy if they found out about the gift. Jomoc promised his boss never to tell.

Two years later, when Danilo Jomoc received a phone call from the Agila mechanic Vertes. Ser Alexis had been murdered.

The man with the face of a killer cried and cried.

***

Gang Badoy is efficient. She believes in order. She can run eight meetings in a day, teach English at the city jail, host radio shows featuring presidential candidates, and go home in time to tuck a blanket over the occasional stray musician who has set up residence on her living room couch.

On September 1, 2009, she received a phone call from UNO Executive Editor Erwin Romulo. Romulo was a close friend, and called often.

“I need your help. I think Alexis and Nika got shot… I don’t know. In their home. I don’t know.”

“Wait for me.”

***

Nathan is 24, and is a Canadian citizen. His father and Alexis’ are brothers, among seven siblings.

“I was born there. I was happy to have been born there. I wanted to live the Canadian dream.”

He had worked his way up to store manager at a Vancouver hardware store before he decide he wasn’t meant for retail.

“I already had plans to move here before Alexis passed away. Retail wasn’t something I wanted to do. I kind of screwed myself into a corner. And yeah, I broke up with my girlfriend of four years. She was Chinese. No offense to the Chinese. I thought I’d find myself a Filipino wife, keep the Tiosecos as Filipino as I can.”

Nathan now runs Agila, along with his mother’s travel agency. Three days a week he spends two hours at their Tandang Sora office, and another two in Taguig. He manages the sales, oversees accounting, handles staff problems and acts as liaison between the family and the business. Alexis barely managed a trip once a week.

Among several properties owned by the Tioseco clan was a six-bedroom home in Phoenix Subdivision. In 1990, a family named Reyes rented out the property. In 1993, they offered to buy the home, at a price Nathan says was estimated at fifteen million. The Reyeses put down about a fifth of the asking price.

The Tioseco family filed a case several years later. The Reyeses, says Nathan, refused to pay the rest of the fifteen million, and refused to vacate the premises. Alexis’ and Nathan’s fathers led the complaint.

At the death of Nathan’s father, his mother Elizabeth continued the case from Canada. Alexis stood for his father in Manila.

On the white board on the kitchen wall at the house in Times Street, the date for the next court hearing was written in black marker.

***

“I saw a few people outside,” says Gang Badoy. “The police had just arrived. I thought, someone should tell his mom.”

Nobody had the numbers of any of the family in Vancouver.

Gang stood at the police line and spoke to one of the officers. “Sir, I am his legal guardian. He has no family here. I need to speak to his parents.”

She asked them to check the white board that hung on the kitchen wall, to copy any of the Canadian phone numbers.

The policeman lifted the police line. They let her in.

“I’ve seen the movies. I watch CSI. I know they’re not supposed to let you in.”

She was wearing a windbreaker that read “John Hopkins Forensics,” a gift from her fiancé. For the rest of the night, the police called her “attorney.”

***

Chris Tioseco once had a crush on Shawn Yao, who had gone to the same university as the Tioseco brothers. Outside the house on Times Street, Shawn volunteered to contact Chris. She said they were Facebook friends. She said he had his number on his page.

“Hello, this is Chris.”

“Chris, this is Shawn, I’m in the Philippines, I’m a friend of Alexis.”

“Shawn?”

“I went to school with the two of you.”

“Okay—why are you calling?”

She was crying on the phone, says Chris Tioseco. She said what she was about to say wasn’t a joke. She said somebody had shot Alexis.

He thought it was a joke. He thought it was a sick joke.

When he realized it wasn’t, he pulled over to the side of the road. And he sat on the street. He thought he was having a heart attack.

He didn’t want to tell anybody. “Cause I knew telling people would make it true.”

***

CRIMINAL CASE NO Q-1.0-164355
ROBBERY WITH HOMICIDE

“That on or about the 1st day of September, 2009, in Quezon City, Philippines, [Criselda Dayag y Gesman, housemaid] conspiring together… With intent to gain, by means of force, violence, and intimidation against persons, did then and there willfully, unlawfully and feloniously rob Magdalena Patpat, Alexis Tioseco and Nica Bohinc, in the manner as follows:

“The said accused, pursuant to their conspiracy, forcibly entered the residence of Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc located at No. 39 Times St. Bgy. West triangle, this City, and once inside, blindfolded and gagged at gunpoint the maid in the said house and therefore took, robbed and carried away…

“That the accused in the course of the commission of the said robbery and as a necessary means to commit the robbery did then and there attack, assault and employ personal violence upon the persons of Alexis Arellano Tioseco and Nica Bohinc [sic], by then and there shooting them several times, thereby inflicting upon them serious and mortal wounds which were the direct and immediate cause of their untimely death, to the damage and prejudice of said victims and of the offended party.

Contrary to Law
Quezon City, Philippines, February 15, 2010

***

Translated transcript, from Media in Focus, “Corruption of Culture,” hosted by Cheche Lazaro on ANC, on the nomination of Carlo J. Caparas as National Artist for Film.

Airdate: 06 Aug 09

Caparas: The Maggie de La Riva Story, lumabas siya ng pelikulang yon [referring to National Artist Bienvenido Lumbera], pero pinasok ng apat na milyon sa Metro Maynila pa lang.

Lazaro: Okay, is that the measure, Alexis, of the success of a filmmaker, for example, like Mr Caparas? Is it measured by the till?

Tioseco: I think if we were to measure our culture by the amount of people who watched it then we would have a lot more respect for the talent of Willie Revillame as a host. I don’t think we’ll be giving cultural awards to Wowowee.

Caparas: …Sasabihin ng isang kamukha mo na ang ginagawa ng isang kamukha ni Willie ay kabawasan sa kulturang Pilipino, mali ka ‘jan. Bata ka pa nga.

***

Jomoc was in the Agila LPG refilling plant when Vertes, the Agila mechanic, came in with several policemen in blue.

One of them asked to talk to Jomoc. Vertes was told to leave.

They went through Jomoc’s locker. They said they were looking for a laptop. They took Jomoc’s cellphone, his watch, a pearl necklace, and a new scythe he had bought to cut through grass. They went through his truck.

It was only in the service vehicle, on the way to Caringal, that Jomoc found out he was being arrested for the murder of Ser Alexis.

They had already picked up his wife Jessica. Jomoc says it was to make certain he went along.

In Camp Caringal, they asked him where his associates were. They told him, if you felt any debt to Alexis, you should have been to the funeral.

He said he didn’t know where the funeral was. He said he wanted to go, but the Agila vehicle had already left. He said he had no way to get there.

They showed him a cartographic sketch. They asked him, does this man look like you?

He said it did, a little. Only the cheeks seemed bigger. And the hair was shorter.

“See,” they said. “See, you even admitted it.”

***

Letter Referral
From the Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit, Camp Karingal, Sikatuna Village, Quezon City.
September 7, 2009

The Honorable City Prosecutor
Quezon City, Metro Manila

Sir:

I have the honor to refer to you herewith cases of MURDER and ROBBERY (2 counts) wherein the accused are:

1) DANILO JOMOC y DIDAL, 47 years old, married, native of Leyte and residing at No. 353 Tandang Sora St., Brgy. Culiat, Quezon City. (Under Custody).
2) CRISELDA DAYAG y GESMAN, 46 years old, native of Zamboanga del Sur and residning at No. 63 General Segundo St. Heroes Hills, Brgy. Sta Cruz, Quezon City (At-Large)
3) JOHN DOE – At-Large
4) PETER DOE – At-Large

COMPLAINANT: People of the Philippines to be represented by PO2 LORETO TIGNO and PO2 JOYCELYN MARCELO

VICTIMS:
1. NIKA BOHINC, 30 years old, live-in partner, film maker, Slovenian National (DECEASED)
2. ALEXIS ARELLANO TIOSECO; 29 years old, live-in partner, film maker, Canadian National (DECEASED)

FACTS OF THE CASE:

“…on September 3, 2009, witness CARLITO CLARO gave the composite illustration of one of the accused (evidence no. 14) which matched to the picture attached in the bio-data of accused GANILO JOMOC SR and same picture was identified as the very same person who drove the getaway Ford lynx.

“Based on the evidence on hand, witnesses SPO1 RIVERA, PO3 SALTA, PO3 PALLASIGUE, PO3 FABRO and PO2 TIGNO conducted continuous surveillance and manhunt operations in different places of Quezon City, to locate the whereabouts and arrest the above-named accused. As a result thereof, accused DANILO JOMOC was arrested on September 5, 2009 at Taguig City.”

***

“This is Paola,” says Manang proudly. “This is Bettina.”

The living room is empty. The tiles have been scrubbed. There is a lamp, a one-seater couch, a chair. There is a sheet of cardboard taped over a broken glass panel beside the front door.

Manang is holding a photo. In the picture, she stands between the Tioseco sisters, pretty girls who have Alexis’ eyes.

She says she keeps them in her room. Paola and Bettina and Alexis, beside faded pictures of the Virgin Mary.

***

The day of Alexis’ funeral, the Quezon City Police Department called the Tioseco girls. They insisted they come to Manila. The funeral was in Angeles City.

“We met with three police officers at a café in a little hotel near the police station,” Paola says. “It was there that they informed us that they had our driver Jomoc in custody and that they had an eyewitness placing him as the driver of the getaway car on the night of the murders.”

The policemen demanded they press charges.

“They said if we didn’t do it, it would look like we don’t care about our brother.”

The two girls were crying, but they refused to press charges. They asked the police to stop. The men apologized, but they didn’t stop.

They called their boss and complained about the girls in Filipino.

“Bettina and I were scared. We didn’t know what to do.”

They felt the police were looking for a scapegoat—“So they could look like heroes without anything resembling a proper investigation.”

***

“Personally, I think the Reyeses will stoop to anything, any tactic, to delay the case.”

After years of court battles, one year after the murder of Alexis and Nika, the Reyeses were finally ejected from the Phoenix Subdivision home. Nathan himself directed the ejection.

“I stood across the street and let Mrs Reyes see me laugh,” says Nathan. “After everything they put my family through, I wanted the last laugh.”

The house was large; the garage housed four cars.

Thirty men, including the sheriff, armed with a break-open order from court, entered the Phoenix property. They carted out carved wooden chairs, gold-plated candlesticks, a grand piano and boxes of Reynolds wrap. Mrs Reyes arrived and began screaming at the sheriff.

“Alexis’ name was in every court document. The address of the Times Street house was in every file. My mother was in Canada, so officially, it was Alexis who was on record.”

***

The police asked Jomoc to stand in front of tinted glass. They told him to face left. They told him to face the wall.

They said the witness had identified him. 100%.

***

“Memory is a strange thing,” says Gang Badoy.

When she told her story to Alexis’ lawyer the first time, she tells him she saw the two bodies from the garage window at number 39.

“When I went back and looked again, some time later, it was physically impossible to see through the window.”

She saw Nika first when they let her in. The yellow sweater stood out in the blood.

“She looked uncomfortable. I wanted to fix her position. She was always so poised, so dignified. She didn’t look like that then.”

***

From the Crime Laboratory Office, Station 10, Medico-Legal Report No. A-564-09.

TIME AND DATE RECEIVED: 0840H 02 Sept 2009

SPECIMEN SUBMITTED: Cadaver Nika Bohinc, 30 years old 178 cms tall, and a resident of # 39 Times St. West Triangle, Quezon City.

FINDINGS:

“… Clothing consisted of a yellow jacket and a black, short dress, both of which were listed above the waist. Her underwear was black and undisturbed, save for damage related to bullet wounds. Body was found prone and was undoubtedly moved form initial position at her heath.

“Gunshot wound I, thru and thru, penetrating point of entry, left upper quadrant of the abdomen.

“Gunshot wound II, thru and thru, penetrating point of entry, (near) left hip joint.”

CAUSE OF DEATH: Gunshot wound at the abdomen.

***

The police did not have body bags. They used bedsheets from Alexis’ bedroom. Gang had to go upstairs to strip the beds.

They asked her if she had duct tape.

Investigators stepped around his body. There were skid marks on the kitchen floor, and footprints. Gang is not sure whose blood.

“I kept asking, are you supposed to step on that? Shouldn’t the crime scene be preserved?”

She shakes her head now. “Of course I didn’t know anything. But they didn’t know that. They just kept telling me it didn’t matter anymore, because they already took photos.”

One policeman sat by the kitchen table, talking on the phone.

“They were just hangin’, you know.”

At three in the morning Manang went into the kitchen. Gang had told her to prepare clothes, that she couldn’t sleep in the house. Manang walked to the plastic rice bin, picked it up, and tried to open the refrigerator door.

She couldn’t. Alexis’ body was in the way. Gang stopped her. The police did not.

“I kept thinking, that’s not how it is on CSI. Manang shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t even be allowed here.”

Manang does not remember the incident.

They had one stretcher, and slid Nika into the van. When they went back to get Alexis’s body, a trail of her blood followed the stretcher back into the house.

***

Outside the house on Times Street on the 1st of September, the murmuring had begun. Filmmakers in shawls, in slippers, in thin T-shirts.

It was Caparas, they said. It must have been Caparas.

“I wouldn’t discount it,” says Erwin.

***

Chris Tioseco and Erwin Romulo visited the office of medico-legal officer Mamerto Bernabe. There were photos from crime scenes on the walls. They were afraid they would see Alexis and Nika.

“Are these your pending cases?”

A police officer answered. “No, some of those are old. We just like to put them up there. Sometimes we even put them out in the hall.”

***

From the Crime Laboratory Office, Station 10, Medico-Legal Report No. A-563-09.

TIME AND DATE RECEIVED: 0840H 02 Sept 2009

SPECIMEN SUBMITTED: Cadaver of Alexis a. Tioseco, 28 years old 169 cms tall, and a resident of # 39 Times St. West Triangle, Quezon City.

CAUSE OF DEATH: Gunshot wounds of the back and chest.

***

Chris spoke to Bernabe in his Canadian English. He was asking for copies of autopsy reports from the crime lab. He was unsuccessful.

Erwin was left in the office.

Bernabe suddenly switched to Filipino. “It was like we were suddenly buddies, compadres. Man to man, you know. Filipino to Filipino.”

In what Erwin describes as excruciating detail, Bernabe described how Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc were killed in the kitchen of 39 Times Street.

“Tinapos ‘yang kaibigan mo.”

Bernabe was unhappy that the family intended to send the reports to an independent forensic pathologist. He said Dr. Raquel Fortun always had it in for him.

Erwin told him the family was going to consult with Canadian experts.

“The right thing for the family to do is to fly me to Canada. I should be the one consulting with them.”

Bernabe, when asked for verification, offers no comment.

***

Jomoc had told the police the accusations were impossible. He was in Batangas hauling gas, he said.

“What if we find your fingerprints in the car?”

He was in jail for several days. His wife Jessica had come with a lawyer.

The Tioseco family tried to stop his arraignment. They said he had an alibi. They were unsuccessful.

***

Nathan Tioseco says they found odd objects inside the Reyes home, wrapped in red cloth and tossed into the trash.

Thin sheets of paper, folded and refolded. Framing the page were handwritten letters, Sator Arepo Tenet Opera Rota. The letters were repeated in sequence. The Sator Square, a ward against evil.

Under the heading: October 15, 1951.

Written under the date, thirteen times. Elizabeth Trinidad Tioseco.

Under the thirteen lines, in Filipino.

“All spells, all black magic, all curses, to block your livelihood. All evil intentions against my family and my lawyer. All of this, to return, to rebound to you, all, all, to attack you. You will not think wrong of me, or of my children or of this house. You will be afraid to speak to me.”

Another sheet of paper has the Tioseco lawyer’s name written in the same manner.

There is a business card, of Attorney Orlando Ana F. Siapno, the Tioseco lawyer, with his office and residence. In pencil, written over the words, are the following in Filipino.

“You will give up the case of Elizabeth T. Tioseco. You will be afraid because you will be in danger…” More words, too blurred to read. Then, “You will be afraid of me.”

There is a torn photo, pieced together carefully.

Nathan’s mother, Elizabeth, born on October 15, 1951.

***

The Tioseco family, using connections provided by various friends, managed to secure a meeting with then Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera. The family hoped to move the case from the PNP to the National Bureau of Investigation.

The NBI was reluctant. They had many reasons. They said there were legal concerns. They said they could not investigate with the Jomoc case open.

Paola was in tears.

***

Nine months from the murder of Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc, a resolution.

FROM DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE RESOLUTION I.S. No. 09I-033395
Approved 2010 June 07

“Danilo Jomoc denied any involvement in the robbery and killings during preliminary investigation as he was allegedly in Batangas City to haul LPG gas and that this even took all day as his truck broke down and they had to wait for the company mechanic Julie G. Bertis to arrive from Quezon City to fix it. This was confirmed by his pahinante Judy T. Villanueva and the mechanic Julie G. Bertis. At around 10:25 o’clock in the evening of 1 September 2009, Danilo Jomoc arrived at the Total Gas Depot Facility in Taguig Metro Manila and never left the facility as he slept therein.

“The other maid, Magdalena Patpat, who knew Jomoc personally likewise swore in her affidavit dated 7 December 2009 that respondent Jomoc was not among those who robbed and killed the victims Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc.

“Considering the foregoing, the complaint against respondent Danilo Jomoc is dismissed for lack of probable cause to hold him for trial for the crime committed against the victims herein.”

***

Early this year, Criselda was spotted in Cagayan. The police didn’t have a car or a warrant. One sergeant sidled up to Erwin, and offered to bring her in if he provided a car and driver.

“We can just plant shabu on her.”

For a moment Erwin considered it. He called the Tioseco lawyer, Theodore Te, and was told it would endanger the case. He called his driver back.

***

The arrested man had the face of a killer. Shifting eyes, tangled hair, cheeks so thin the bones sliced sharp against skin. At the time of his incarceration, he was the father of nine, with one more on the way.

Now his wife is dead from meningitis. He owes Agila more than twenty thousand in loans for her treatment. His last child was born four months premature. And the police still have his cell phone.

He rubs at his pant leg.

His name is Danilo D. Jomoc, Sr. Because there were men who thought he had the face of a killer, the real killers continue to walk in the open, wearing the last faces Jomoc’s Ser Alexis saw.

First published in UNO Magazine September ’10.