A BATANGAS court sentenced to life imprisonment on June 30 a woman who had recruited two minors with the intention of making them sex workers in Puerto Galera, in what antitrafficking NGOs hailed as a “landmark conviction.”
Judge Florencio Arellano also ordered the female trafficker to pay P2 million in fine and P50,000 in moral damages to each of the victims after finding her guilty of qualified trafficking under Republic Act No. 9208 or the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003.
Security guards at the Batangas port rescued the victims, then minors, and three women in March 2005 after the trafficker could not explain the nature of their recruitment and provide details of their travel.
The minors later testified that they were promised jobs as waitresses in Batangas City.
Ma. Cecilia Flores-Oebanda, president and executive director of the antitrafficking NGO Visayan Forum Foundation, said the court decision is a “landmark conviction.”
“The court gave weight to the testimony of the victims that their trafficker, during the initial stages of the recruitment, forced to check on their virginity and ages then told them they are fit to work as guest relations officers and that foreigners would demand them highly for sex-related services,” she said.
Flores-Oebanda added, “The court interpreted this as trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation, even if the victims have not actually landed into prostitution.”
The International Justice Mission and local antitrafficking task force authorities helped the minors pursue the case. The Visayan Forum Foundation had sheltered the victims at its halfway house at the Batangas port.
Department of Justice records show only 11 traffickers in seven cases have been convicted since the antitrafficking law was enacted in 2003.
