Police probe two motives in Kent Carpenter killing

By Glazyl M. Jopson

BACOLOD CITY — The Negros Oriental Police Provincial Office is investigating robbery and a possible connection to American marine biologist Kent Carpenter’s professional work as motives in his killing in Sibulan over the weekend.

Police Col. Timmar Alam, the provincial police director, heads the Special Investigation Task Group investigating Carpenter’s death.

In a phone interview Wednesday, Alam said several valuables were reported missing from Carpenter’s home in Barangay Ajong.

The missing items included PHP 75,000 in cash, a laptop and a pair of binoculars.

Alam said the attackers may have entered through a terrace at the back of the house because investigators found no signs of forced entry at the crime scene.

Investigators initially focused on three suspected assailants.

Police were also looking into two people seen in the area who allegedly served as lookouts.

Alam said police initially considered Carpenter’s 34-year-old partner a person of interest because she was with him during the attack, but she was later treated as a witness.

“We gave time for the witness to recall everything,” he added.

Alam said the couple had not noticed any suspicious people in the area before the attack.

Carpenter, 73, was found dead with gunshot wounds to the head in the living room Sunday night.

His partner was wounded in the attack.

Carpenter was a professor and eminent scholar of biological sciences at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.

He was one of two expert witnesses presented by the Philippines in its South China Sea arbitration case against China.

The proceedings resulted in a 2016 ruling by an arbitral tribunal administered by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, according to case records.

In a Facebook post, the University of the Philippines Marine Science Institute said Carpenter served as a pivotal scientific adviser to the country during the arbitration.

The institute said he provided expert reports, testimony, satellite images and video evidence documenting the condition of coral reefs in the disputed waters.

Carpenter’s work also helped the Philippines gain recognition as the “center of the center of marine shore fish biodiversity.”

His pioneering studies of Philippine coral reefs, reef-associated fish and fisheries helped lay the foundation for coral reef ecology.

Carpenter advocated for the Verde Island Passage to be designated as a national protected area and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

He also contributed his expertise to Tubbataha Reefs Natural Park, joining several fish surveys and publishing research on the area since 2018.

The UP Marine Science Institute mourned Carpenter’s death and called for justice.

“We join the marine science community in shared grief and the collective call for justice to be served,” it said.

Carpenter’s collaboration with Silliman University in Dumaguete City began in 1976, when he worked with the late National Scientist Angel C. Alcala and other marine scientists on pioneering studies of the Philippines’ marine ecosystems.