Main suspect in 2009 Philippine massacre of 58 people, including journalists, dies in hospital

FILE - In this Monday March 26, 2012, file photo, Andal Ampatuan Sr., center, a powerful Filipino clan leader who is a suspect in the 2009 massacre of 57 people, listens during his arraignment on electoral sabotage at the Pasay city regional trial court, south of Manila, Philippines. Ampatuan's lawyer, Salvador Panelo says his client died overnight on Friday, July 17, 2015, in a government hospital. Ampatuan was brought to the National Kidney and Transplant Institute in early June and was diagnosed with liver cancer.(AP Photo/Noel Celis, Pool, File) (The Associated Press)

FILE - In this Saturday, Dec. 12, 2009, file photo, soldiers dig out thousands of rounds of M16 and M14 ammunition buried in the pit outside the farm of Maguindanao Gov. Andal Ampatuan Sr., in Shariff Aguak township, Maguindanao province in southern Philippines. The lawyer for Ampatuan, one of the main suspects on trial for the 2009 massacre of 58 people in the southern Philippines, says his client died overnight on Friday, July 17, 2015, in a government hospital. Ampatuan was brought to the National Kidney and Transplant Institute in early June and was diagnosed with liver cancer. (AP Photo/Froilan Gallardo, File) (The Associated Press)

MANILA, Philippines – A lawyer says one of the main suspects on trial for the 2009 massacre of 58 people in the southern Philippines has died of a heart attack.

Salvador Panelo says his client Andal Ampatuan Sr., a former governor of Maguindanao province, died overnight in a government hospital. Ampatuan was brought to the National Kidney and Transplant Institute in early June and was diagnosed with liver cancer.

Ampatuan was among 103 people, including several of his sons and other relatives, who were charged with multiple murder in the Maguindanao massacre, one of the worst political killings in the Philippines.

They were accused of killing 58 people in a convoy of vehicles, which included their political rival and 32 journalists. It was also the world's worst single killing of media workers.