A FEW days back, we heard a local police official say that many of the rape cases – and we assume these include incidents in Davao City – happen inside motels.
If what the police officer said is true, then some non-lothario male lawmakers should start thinking of introducing a bill in Congress making it a crime – although lesser in degree –rape with consent. After all, a woman who accompanies a man inside a motel room is subtly agreeing to the latter’s evil design on her.
But, of course, it is another story if one more crime is committed prior to the crime of rape. Say, the woman is abducted or forced into a vehicle and brought to the motel using intimidation. Unfortunately, it becomes the burden of the victim to prove that indeed she was forcibly dragged into the motel by the perpetrator before her complaint becomes credible beyond reasonable doubt that indeed she was raped inside the motel room and did not consent to accompany the suspect inside.
These circumstances all the more make the crime of rape challenging to prosecute, more so because most victims and their relatives would rather suffer in silence than be haunted with shame by the stigma of being a rape victim or parents of one.
The case of that lady architect from Calinan, Davao City, is, of course, a different story. We will not be surprised if the widowed mother of the victim and their immediate relatives will pursue vigorously the case against the suspect or suspects once he or they are arrested.
The victim’s kin wants immediate justice for the victim’s death more than the ignominious crime of rape against her.
By the way, we hope there is truth to the report that the Special Investigation Task Group (SITG) charged with probing the rape-slay of the lady architect already has at least five“persons of interest” in the commission of the heinous crime.
The SITG has not yet given any name to the five. But from what was said by the SITG with regards to the five, it appears that somehow the strategy being worked on by the agents is somewhat similar to what we had been suggesting sans solicitation in this space. That is, the probers focused on identifying the owner of the Umbac tricycle used in the crime.
Perhaps what the probers did was to locate the dealer of the unit in Calinan or in Davao City, where the agents could have possibly gotten the list of new buyers and their addresses. From there, the succeeding work of the SITG becomes easier, and the suspect/s could already be slowly pushed into the wall.
In the next few days, we look forward to knowing if “persons of interest” will finally become the leading suspects in the rape-slay.
And if the parents of the suspects are already aware that their son is involved, then they better convince them to voluntarily give up and not prolong their dodging the law. The parents might be having their own grief later – the very same feeling that the mother of their victim is suffering now.
The one million pesos reward offered by Congressman Polong Duterte to whoever can lead the police to the identity/ies of the suspect/s is too difficult to resist.
*****************************
A group in Davao del Norte calling itself a coalition announced it had filed a case against Provincial Governor Edwin Jubahib for allegedly using government vehicles in hauling people for a gathering showing support to change the power distribution firm in the province due to poor service and exorbitant cost.
Local government leaders in the said province are bent on pushing for having the power distribution services privatized. And the leading figure in the effort is no other than Governor Jubahib. The change move is in reaction to the long-voiced out consumers complaint of the Northern Davao Electric Cooperative (NORDECO), especially the business community. The latter believes the poor electric service of the cooperative hampers the socio-economic growth of the province.
Petitions are signed by Davao del Norte residents, and LGU resolutions are forwarded to the Office of the President and Congress, hoping that these will help those concerned government departments see the true predicament of the NORDECO consumers.
Now, this coalition suddenly surfaced, manifesting support for the continuation of electricity distributorship by the power cooperative, high cost and poor service notwithstanding.
Whose interest is the coalition (kuno) working for, or who are the supposed coalition working with? Is it the interest of the consuming public, or is it the interest of those running the electric cooperative whose failure to augment the level of service of the power firm only adds up to the perdition that the supposed cooperative members are currently suffering?
Look at IGaCoS, the island city has all the potential of a top tourist destination, but the tourists and tourist amenities owners are complaining that it cannot exploit to the maximum the gifts that nature gives the city due to poor quality of electricity service.
