At the border of Teachers Village, Sikatuna Village and Barangay Botocan, the Philippine National Police (PNP) Camp Karingal. The police camp is the headquarters of the Quezon City Police District, which was previously known as the Northern Police District (NPD) of the then PC-INP (Philippine Constabulary-Integrated National Police). Before the camp was constructed in 1974, the area was the location of a police precinct of the Philippine Constabulary’s Philippine Constabulary Metropolitan Command (MetroCom). Before the construction of Camp Karingal, the NPD headquarters was part of the PC-INP’s Camp Rafael Cramé, along Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA for short).
The camp is named after Brigadier General Tomas Bingo Karingal (1915-1984), the longest serving chief of the Northern Police District. Karingal was first noted as a Philippine Army lieutenant during World War II (1939-1945), as a member of the USAFFE (United States Army Forces in the Far East) Counter Intelligence Corps, who was gathering information with Sergeant Jose S. Maniquis in the Cordillera towns of Bayombong, Solano, Payawan; Kiangan, Pagong, Banawe, Bontoc, Sadanga, Bangad, Lubuangan, Banat, Lagan-ilang, Bangued, and San Quintin was transmitted to Bataan Headquarters, in 1942. Later that year, Karingal was captured and tortured by the Japanese in Camp Pangatian, Cabanatuan; but he was able to escape and join the USAFFE forces in Leyte, on January 1945. Karingal’s bravery earned him the Philippine Medal of Valor, the highest award for a member of the military. After the war, Karingal joined the Philippine Constabulary, and would head the Iloilo Provincial Command, before his appointment as lieutenant colonel and chief of the NPD in 1960. By 1963, Karingal was reassigned as the head of the Batangas Provincial Command, the as the chief of the Customs Law Enforcement Command in 1965, and finally back to the NPD in 1967 until his death. In 1984, General Karingal was assassinated by the Communist Alex Boncayao Brigade, near the NPD camp.
In 1990, the Seiko film group produced the film “Ako ang Batas: General Karingal” (I am the Law), with John Regala (born John Paul Guido Boucher Scherrer, 1965) playing Karingal during the war, and Eduardo “Eddie” Verchez García (1929-2019) as the older general. General Karingal is buried at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (Heroes Cemetery).
Before the name was changed to honor General Karingal, it was called Camp Datuin. Without any available records, the camp could have been named after Bernabe M. Datuin of the Counter Intelligence Corps, who may have worked with the then-lieutenant Karingal, and died either in battles of Corregidor or Bataan in 1942. Another possible candidate is Sergeant Pedro Datuin, of the 45th Infantry Philippine Scouts, and whose body was never recovered.
Two years after his murder, Camp Datuin was renamed to Camp Karingal, to honor the man who fought against foreign invaders in World War II, and served Quezon City as its chief of police for more than 20 years. Despite that decorated past, there is little information about Genral Karingal for the next generations to be inspired by his heroism and service to the Filipino people.
There is little left to remember the life of Gen. Tomas Karingal, with the exception of a highly exaggerated bio-film, a police camp, and an annual award given to distinguished members of the PNP. However, the details of his real life are lost to the annals of time, with the exception of his family and friends. If one searches the internet, most information appears on his assassination or his role in the investigation of a high profile kidnap-rape case in the 1960s. Left-leaning people may note of his role in leading the METROMCOM during the violent dispersal of several factory strikes, and the 1971 Diliman Commune; hence making him the target of Communist hitmen. Others remember his role in accompanying the family of the slain oppositionist leader, Senator Benigno Simeon “Ninoy” Lampa Aquino Jr. (1932-1983), when they arrived at the Manila International Airport, days after he was assassinated in 1983; or his dramatic meeting with Vice-President Emmanuel Neri Pelaez (1915-2003), shortly after an attempted assassination on the statesman in 1983. Yet all of these are but minor details in Gen. Karingal’s service to the country, starting in the 1930s until his death, and this article is an attempt to discover more about the man.
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