Motive Probed in Newspaperman’s Slaying

Amid angry charges that supporters of Philippine President Ferdinand E. Marcos were behind the slaying of a Filipino-American newspaper executive, federal and local investigators said Thursday it was still too early to be certain what the motive was.

Oscar Salvatierra, employed in Los Angeles by the Philippine News, a San Francisco-based weekly paper that has strongly opposed Marcos, received a death threat letter attacking the newspaper’s political stance one day before being shot to death in the bedroom of his Glendale home Wednesday.

But despite the death threat--and accusations in Los Angeles, Washington and Manila that Marcos or his supporters appeared responsible for the killing--local authorities said they were looking for possible personal or business-related motives as well as searching for evidence of political terrorism.

Fred Reagan, an FBI spokesman in Los Angeles, said that political assassination “obviously . . . is a strong possibility” but that the bureau is “going in a lot of directions.”

Glendale Police Agent Christopher Loop, asked at a press conference whether the killing appeared to be politically motivated, said: “That has not been ruled out or justified.”

And Cmdr. William Booth, spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department, said that “it is premature to make a presumption of what the motivation is.”

The investigation takes place against a background of charges that agents of the Philippine government have a record of harassing anti-Marcos leaders in the United States, and talk by some Filipino-Americans that Salvatierra’s wide-ranging business interests might have gotten him into trouble. At least six Glendale police officers and members of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Asian Task Force and Anti-Terrorist Division joined the FBI on the case.

The 41-year-old newspaper executive and father of four had worked for the paper less than a year as its Los Angeles marketing director and was not a writer. An accountant, he was known in Los Angeles’ large Filipino-American community as an advocate for “affirmative action” and as a political moderate who sought to remain on friendly terms with both pro- and anti-Marcos factions.

Despite uncertainty expressed by law enforcement officials, some congressional leaders in Washington pointed to the killing as an act of political terrorism.

“Given the death threats which Mr. Salvatierra received, there seems little doubt at this point that his assassination was politically motivated,” said Rep. Stephen J. Solarz (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs. “The only question is whether it was somehow directed by the government of the Philippines.”

Sens. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) and Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) introduced a resolution Thursday calling for a full and swift investigation of Salvatierra’s slaying, and asking President Reagan to “personally convey” to the Philippines government a request for cooperation in the investigation.

“If the Salvatierra murder can be tied to officials of the Philippine government, it must be understood as more than a mad act of personal retribution,” said Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa), ranking Republican on the Asian and Pacific affairs subcommittee. “It would symbolize an assault on the American democratic system.”

An FBI agent close to the case, who spoke on condition that he not be identified, said the bureau “is going to get into this in a very strong fashion.”

“I think there’s going to be a lot of fallout about this for the Marcos government,” the agent added.

Coroner’s investigator Bob Dambacher said Salvatierra died of multiple gunshot wounds to the head, but details on the number of bullet wounds or the caliber of ammunition were withheld.

In Manila, Philippine opposition leader Corazon Aquino hailed Salvatierra as a martyr to the cause of “a truly free Philippines.” Marcos was declared the victor over Aquino last week amid allegations of fraud in counting the ballots of the Feb. 7 presidential election.

“I am saddened deeply by the death of Oscar Salvatierra,” Aquino said in a statement released by her office. “That the murder occurred thousands of miles away from home does not diminish my concern, because he died as many others of his countrymen did--in defense of truth, freedom, justice and democracy.”

The Philippines acting consul in Los Angeles deplored the killing on Wednesday, but suggested that Marcos’ opponents were using it “to make political capital.”

Informed His Wife

Salvatierra’s younger brother, who declined to be identified by name, said that Salvatierra had told his wife of the death threat he received Tuesday, but had not informed other family members of it.

“I wish he had told us he had gotten the threat,” the brother said. “We could have maybe watched out for him.”

The brother said that Salvatierra’s father-in-law owned land in the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, where the family grew ginger root. Salvatierra imported the ginger.

But in the last couple of years, Salvatierra, who emigrated to the U.S. in the mid-1960s, had gotten out of the business. He had also, for a time, had a business exporting U.S. videotapes to sell at an outlet in the Philippines.

Salvatierra had an accounting degree from his homeland and was active for nearly a decade in an ultimately successful battle to win recognition in California for Philippine accounting degrees, his brother said.

Salvatierra’s son, Arnel, 17, said his father “looked into a lot of business ventures.”

Prepared Tax Returns

“He was a really busy person,” Arnel said, adding that in recent weeks, his father was especially busy preparing tax returns in addition to his work for the paper.

Filipino-American acquaintances of Salvatierra recalled that he had been involved in at least one rancorous business relationship that may have emerged out of his accounting work.

Others said the slaying may have been part of a pattern of official Philippine harassment in this country.

At a downtown rally calling for a boycott of businesses with ties to the Marcos government, demonstration organizer Danny Lamila said he received a death threat Wednesday afternoon.

“I’m scared, of course I’m scared,” Lamila said. “What they want is to silence us. . . . (But) it will make us more courageous until justice and freedom are achieved in the Philippines.”

In 1983, a secret Defense Intelligence Agency report on five agents assigned to the Philippine Embassy in Washington was released by Rep. Don Edwards (D-San Jose), who charged that agents of the Philippine government were illegally spying on and harassing anti-Marcos activists in the United States. Edwards also charged that Marcos agents might have been involved in the June, 1981, murder of two Filipino union officials in Seattle.

The DIA document stated that “the (military) attaches will undoubtedly report on, and possibly operate against, anti-Marcos Philippine activists in the U.S.”

Messages Intercepted

The day after Edwards released the document, former Carter Administration officials were quoted as saying that the United States had intercepted messages from Manila to Filipino agents in this country in 1978 ordering them to harass anti-Marcos activists.

The Philippine News, established in 1961, claims a nationwide circulation of 70,000. Alex Esclamado, the publisher, has said that Marcos supporters have sought to to purchase the paper or drive it out of business through an advertising boycott. Last March the paper filed for reorganization under federal bankruptcy law.

Salvatierra’s funeral, which will be open to the public, has been scheduled for 2 p.m. Saturday at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale.

Staff writers Doyle McManus, in the Philippines, Sara Fritz, in Washington, and Sam Enriquez, Denise Hamilton, Joel Sappell and William Overend in Los Angeles contributed to this article.