Friend turns killer

When Lorna Lim Varona, 51, failed to return home that Sunday for the first time in her 32 years in Dubai, her husband Pablo Varona thought something serious could have happened.

He reported his missing wife to the Dubai Police the following day. But, nothing as dismal as death occurred in his mind.

The Sharjah Police found Lorna’s body bathed in a pool of blood inside the trunk of her Jaguar car, found abandoned near Industrial Area Number 11 in Sharjah on Saturday, a week after she went missing.

Officials from the Criminal Investigation Department asked Pablo, a hook-up manager at McDermott Middle East, about possible suspects. Pablo said he immediately remembered that in recent days his wife had told him about a long time family friend, Ricardo ‘Eric’ Bechavez, who wanted Lorna to meet someone, who would pay back the huge amount he borrowed from Lorna. He also asked Lorna to release his passport, which she kept as a guarantee. “I told the CIDs that our family friend Bechavez, in his early 50s, is my suspect.”

Pablo said Bechavez borrowed Dh250,000 from Lorna on several occasions to finance small contract projects. “His debts piled up because most of the time he would make excuses saying that the contract was cancelled. At other times, he claimed that the company which contracted him to do interior designing did not pay him.”

Pablo recalled many conversations with his wife telling him that Bechavez turned over his passport to her as a guarantee for borrowing more funds. “Lately, my wife said that Bechavez wanted to get his passport from her because someone wanted to employ him as an interior designer and he was willing to pay back all his debts.”

It was in these succeeding days that his wife disappeared. Pablo believed that his wife was lured by Bechavez to come with him to meet his “prospective employer” so he could kill her.

Though Bechavez was arrested by the police on Saturday, it was only early Sunday that Pablo was informed by the CID officials that Bechavez had confessed to the crime.

Pablo told Khaleej Times that Bechavez had become a close family friend to the couple 20 years ago when they met him and contracted him to do some interior designing in their shops and offices. “My wife was practically running our business interests in Dubai as I have been working with McDermott since 1978. More so in 1997, I was transferred to McDermott Indonesia and only in December 2011 was I brought back to McDermott Middle East here in Dubai.”

A dear friend

Many Filipinos in the business circle, friends and members of the Filipino community, who benefitted from her charity works, miss Lorna.

Jun Tupas, a close friend of her husband, described her as a professional business woman with a kind heart for children. “She was very fond of children, and many times, she used to hold special Christmas parties for children in the Filipino community. My children were among those who joined. As a professional business woman, she was strict and meant business,” Jun said.

Lorna was managing four family’s companies named Seaworld Tourism, Capricorn Trading, Capricorn Documentation and Pro Team. She owned the Capricorn Bakery but sold it when she decided to take up other businesses. The couple have four grown up children: Maria Liza, Maria Lourdes, Joseph Luke and Joseph Louis.

Pablo said the family plans to take Lorna’s body to Manila as early as possible, but the CID has asked them to wait until the authorities finish the investigation. “The body is still with the Sharjah Police forensic lab, but it will be turned over to Dubai Police soon.”

lily@khaleejtimes.com