In July 1996, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) concluded that it had found sufficient evidence to prosecute the 21 individuals, 15 of whom were police officers, involved in arresting and subsequently detaining the “Abadilla Five”. In their resolution, the CHR obtained medical evidence and testimonies detailing torture of the victims while in police custody and that their rights envisage under custodial investigation law had been violated. It recommended to the Department of Justice (DoJ) through the National Prosecution Service (NPS) the filing of appropriate criminal charges against the respondents.
However, for five years Marilyn Campomanes the special prosecutor assigned to resolve the Commission’s recommendation has failed to establish whether a “probable cause” exists to prosecute them in court. She has failed to conclude her resolution which should have been completed in within 40 days of the filing of a complaint as required in section 2, Rule 112 of the Revised Rules of Criminal Procedure. The case has been left pending and dragged on for years before Prosecutor Campomanes without any action being taken. She has never been replaced nor the case transferred to another prosecutor.
Not until in August 2001 when the victim’s legal counsel filed administrative charges against Campomanes was the case handed over to a panel of three prosecutors. Prosecutor Campomanes was charged with neglect of duty, loss of the case documents and for failing to resolve the complaint promptly. However, the panel acting on the complaint promptly, concluded to dismiss the case over the subjudice rule. They argued that to proceed with the complaint would “unduly influence or bend the mind of the Supreme Court (SC)” who were at the time reviewing the capital punishment handed down to the five complainants two years earlier. The prosecutors dismissed the complaint, not because of its lack of merit, but because they failed to resolve it within the due time and did not want to be seen as acting in contravention of a decision that would be taken by the SC.
When appeals were made to the panel’s resolution dismissing the complaint, it took another three years before the DoJ’s prosecution service resolved to file charges against the respondents in court. It was only in March 2004 that it submitted recommendations to the Office of the Ombudsman for the Military and Other Law Enforcement Offices (MOLEO), who has the authority to review the DoJ’s resolution and recommend the filing of charges against the respondents in court with finality. By this time, however, six of the respondents had already passed away. Since then the Ombudsman has continuously failed to act in resolving the DoJ’s resolution. The filing of charges cannot proceed unless the Ombudsman completes its review and recommends the indictment. There is no visible progress in this matter though.
Apart from lack of adequate laws on torture, excessive delays in adjudication of the complaints of torture and violations of detainees’ rights under custodial investigation, particularly by the prosecutors, illustrate the trivial possibility that torture victims would obtain remedies or redress at all. As has been mentioned, six of the respondents have already died while others have been able to retire from police service without having been charged. One of the policemen, now retired Senior Superintendent Bartolome Baluyot formerly headed a Police Regional Office 12 in Central Mindanao six years after the incident. He was accused once again of having been involved in another case in which he turned a blind eye to his men allegedly torturing and fabricating evidence against bomb blast suspects in General Santos City in April 2002. He was able to retire without being held to account to any of these cases.
As a result of the continued failure on part of the prosecutor’s office and the Ombudsman, the victims have lost confidence that eleven years on they could obtain remedies and that those responsible would be held to account. The actions by the prosecutor and Ombudsman have effectively denied them any remedies and equal protection to law. The loss of faith and disappointments mutates into lack of interest and persistence, as expected from any torture victim, in pursuing complaints in court which in turn gives the assurance of impunity to perpetrators. They know full well that even though the Ombudsman files charges in court it would take them even longer to complete a trial before a court decides or imposes punishment, if indeed they are proven guilty.
The court is likewise undermined and had not been able to perform its judicial duties because of the failure of filing of charges before them. Years on, the possibility to effectively prosecute the respondents by now may be negligible, not to mention those who have already died and whose guilt or innocence could no longer be proven. To ensure an effective prosecution, there needs to be credible witnesses, sufficient documentation, well-informed police and prosecutors to handle the prosecution of the case and resources for complainants in pursuing the case, amongst others. However, these essential requirements are themselves practically difficult to obtain.
Excessive delay has made the government complicit in denying remedies for victims and tolerating the continuing practice of police torture. For instance, had the complaint been resolved promptly, charges are filed and punishments are imposed, Sr. Supt. Baluyot would have not been assigned to Mindanao only to be complicit in another torture case. He, too, would have not been able to retire from service without having held to account. Under the law, police personnel could be denied either of promotion to higher rank or retirement benefits package once they have pending charges in court. But Sr. Supt. Baluyot was promoted to full colonel and given commendations before he had retired.
In the Abadilla Five case, because no charges were filed in court, the policemen involved could not be deprived of promotion and retirement benefits. The five victims have already been convicted despite serious allegations that the evidence against them and confession were taken under duress, a result of torture and made while they were in illegal detention, as it is concluded by the Commission’s findings in their own investigation in 1996. However, the policemen who committed these violations will not be held to account anytime soon.
Abadilla Five: Jailed for a decade without JUSTICE http://campaigns.ahrchk.net/abadilla5/
