By GERMELINA LACORTE
Mindanews and VERA Files
DAVAO CITY—Alleged accomplices and a suspect in the murder of schoolteacher Rebelyn Pitao have been killed in what seems to be “revolutionary justice” being carried out, as police officials continue to wash their hands of the case, which has not progressed in two years.
Two recent news reports quoted the communist New People’s Army as having claimed responsibility for the killing of one of the soldiers who is a suspect in the 2009 abduction, rape and murder of Rebelyn, the daughter of NPA commander Leoncio Pitao, alias “Kumander Parago.” Two other accomplices were believed killed by the NPA in 2009.
As this developed, Davao police officials have been pointing fingers at each other over who is in charge of “Task Force Rebelyn,” the body that police had set up right after the abduction to investigate the killing, and blamed the victim’s family for the lack of progress.
In February, then Task Force Rebelyn spokesperson and former Superintendent Querubin Manalang refused to answer any questions on the case, saying it had been turned over to the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in the region.
But regional director Senior Superintendent Pedro Cabatingan said, “Hindi sa amin ang kasong iyan(We’re not involved in that case).” When told of Manalang’s statement, Cabatingan corrected himself, saying he still had to ask his staff because he was not around when was Rebelyn killed.
Cabatingan, who assumed office in September 2010, said that although the CIDG is handling the Task Force Rebelyn investigation, he did not know who heads Task Force Rebelyn now.
He replaced former CIDG Regional director Senior Superintendent Generoso Y. Bonifacio, who now serves as the head of the Philippine National Police operations management division in Camp Crame.
Background
Rebelyn was abducted at around 6:30 p.m. on March 4, 2009 as she was on her way home from St. Peter’s College in Toril in Davao City where she worked as a substitute teacher.
That same evening, then police regional director Sr. Superintendent Pedro Tango said he immediately constituted Task Force Rebelyn to include the Davao city police, National Bureau of Investigation and the CIDG.
When the body was found beyond the Davao City boundary—in Carmen, Davao del Norte—the next day, Tango reconstituted the task force to include the Davao del Norte provincial director, chief of the regional intelligence division, and the Carmen police station.
In a public inquiry conducted by the Commission on Human Rights on April 2, 2009, Task Force Rebelyn released the initial results of its investigation, including the autopsy results that showed she had been dead for almost 24 hours when she was found on the evening of March 5.
Rebelyn’s eyes were badly bruised, her neck showed a 3-cm ligature mark which meant she could have been strangled, her body bore five stab wounds, two above her left breast, another two below and another one hitting her lungs. The report also showed she was raped.
Nine of the 13 military suspects summoned testified behind heavy drapes in one of the function halls of the Royal Mandaya hotel on Ponciano Street. The nine all belonged to the Military Intelligence Battalion under the 10th Infranty Division, four of whom were tagged by Parago during an interview with reporters after the killing as military intelligence operatives involved in the abduction of his daughter.
No access to info
Cabatingan has refused to release the documents already made public during that CHR inquiry, which he called a “sensation” that had been used as “propaganda.” He added that documents gathered by Task Force Rebelyn could not be released while the case was still under investigation.
“Unless the case is already in the courts when it’s open to the public, we cannot release any information because it will pre-empt our investigation,” he said. “In fact, I consider those investigators who release such information as careless. If you give any hint as to what lead you are pursuing, you are giving signals to the possible perpetrators, so, they might be able to escape.”
Officials behind the original Task Force Rebelyn have retired or were re-assigned to other posts, and only a few of those who were originally part of it remain on active duty.
Senior Superintendent Candido Casimiro, who first headed the task force, retired in 2009, while Manalang, the task force spokesperson, was recently appointed Digos City chief of police following Tango’s retirement last April.
Police sources said lower units involved in the task force are awaiting its possible reconstitution since Camp Crame recently asked them for updates on the Rebelyn investigation.
But newly appointed police regional director Jaime Morente said there was no need to reconstitute the Task Force since it continues to function even if former officials are no longer around.
Blaming the victim’s family
Cabatingan admitted that the case has hardly moved and blamed this on the refusal of Rebelyn’s parents, Kumander Parago and his wife Evangeline, to cooperate with police.
Evangeline had earlier said in one of the CHR inquiries, “They are the same people who killed my daughter. Why should I cooperate?”
But she cooperated with the CHR investigation, led by then chair Leila de Lima, by attending the three hearings it conducted in Davao City.
As for Parago, he told reporters who went to the NPA camp that the state has resources to conduct the investigation. He added the NPA will also conduct its own investigation and that it will exact revolutionary justice.
But Cabatingan said the government merely wanted Parago to substantiate his allegations that 13 members of the Military Intelligence Battalion unit of the 10th ID and the Military Intelligence Group of Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces killed his daughter.
‘Revolutionary punishment’
Shortly after his daughter’s death, news reports quoted Parago saying he did not expect justice from the state, which he believed ordered his daughter’s killing. He said the national democratic movement, where he belonged, would mete out justice for Rebelyn and all victims of extrajudicial killings.
In fact, months following Rebelyn’s killing, the NPA had owned up to the killing of at least two of those it identified as suspects.
Barely two months after Rebelyn was killed, the NPA claimed to have killed Ruben Bitang whom they accused of driving the vehicle used to kidnap Rebelyn. Rigoberto Sanchez, spokesperson of the NPA Merardo Arce Command, said in a May 7 statement that the NPA’s Ka Paking Guimbaolibot Red Partisan Brigade “meted out revolutionary punishment” against Bitang on JP Laurel Street in Panabo City.
The NPA statement identified Ruben as an uncle of Cpl. Helvin Bitang, one of the first four suspects tagged by Parago for his daughter’s killing.
In an Oct. 26, 2009 statement, the NPA also owned up to the killing of Cpl. Orly Pedregosa in barangay Malabog in Paquibato in Davao for allegedly resisting NPA arrest. Pedregosa was one of the first four suspects Parago initially named for the killing of Rebelyn, and was supposed to be “tried in the people’s court,” the statement said.
“He was armed, dangerous (and resisted) the NPA arresting team that resulted to his death,” said Simon Santiago, NPA political director for Southern Mindanao. The NPA statement contradicted that of the 10th ID, who said Pedregosa was attacked while he was in the church and that two “civilians” were wounded with him.
In April and May this year, two news reports quoted Parago claiming the killing of Cpl. Helvin Bitang, one of the first four suspects in Rebelyn’s killing. Unlike the previous two killings, however, the NPA has been mum about Bitang.
A source close to the Pitaos, however, said that it was not Helvin who was killed this time but another Bitang, also accused by the NPAs of another killing. The source said Bitang had escaped and has been in hiding.
(See sidebar: A mother mourns for daughter, two years after)
(This story is part of the VERA Files project “Human Rights Case Watch” supported by The Asia Foundation and the United States Agency for International Development.)