RIOT IN OPERATION SECOND CHANCE

A team of Special Weapons and Tactics of the Cebu City Police Office rushes to Operation Second Chance after receiving reports of a riot among children in conflict with the law detained at the facility in Barangay Kalunasan, Cebu City.
CDN PHOTO/LITO TECSON

Detainees claim they only want to play basketball; officials say offenders don’t want to be moved to city jail

Eleven detainees broke out of their room past 9 a.m. on Monday and started a riot inside a detention facility in Cebu City intended for juvenile delinquents.

They destroyed monobloc chairs and threw stones that injured one of the guards of the Cebu City Operation Second Chance Center (OSCC) in Barangay Kalunasan.

They claimed that they only wanted to play basketball — a privilege that was taken away from them for more than a month now.

But OSCC officials belied their claim, saying the offenders were protesting their impending transfer to the nearby facility — the Cebu City Jail — since they were no longer minors.

Of the 11, seven were subjects to pending petition before the different courts that they be committed to the regular jail facility since they were no longer minors. If that happened, they would no longer be released unless they would post bail (if the offense was bailable) or be released by the courts following the dismissal of the charges against them.

It is different if they remain at the OSCC since they can be released if they show good behavior.

Chief Insp. Merlina Metante, executive director of OSCC, said the 11 who started the commotion were housed at the facility’s annex building where they placed offenders who were either overaged or were constantly breaking house rules.

“They managed to escape from their cells after they destroyed the padlocks. They ran around the compound and started throwing stones at the guards,” Metante said in Cebuano.

Dioscoro Lariosa, who was guarding the annex building at the time of the riot, sustained bruises and wounds after he was assaulted by the offenders who also threatened the facility staff including the police who responded to the alarm.

“Giingnan pa ko nila nga wala lagi sila nahadlok sa amoa (the guards) kay mga murder lagi kuno ilahang kaso (They told me that they were not afraid of us because they were facing murder charges in court),” Lariosa said.

Since Lariosa was outnumbered, the police and members of the Special Weapons and Tactics were sent in and rounded up the offenders.

At present, the OSCC is home to 178 young offenders attended to by 36 staff members including Metante.

Metante said the offenders staged the riot because they were anxious since they didn’t want to be transferred to the city jail.

“They are alarmed because they know once they are beyond 18 and they know they have grave offenses, they will be transferred to Cebu City Jail,” Metante said.

But the offenders claimed they only wanted to play basketball inside the facility.

“Ang amo lang makaduwa mi. Og makagawas mi dinhi. Kay lapas na sa usa ka buwan nga ilaha ming gi-padlock (We just want to play and to get out of our rooms since it had been a month since they had padlocked us inside our rooms),” one offender said.

Another offender also claimed that the police and other staff pointed their guns at them which made them angry.

“Gusto ra unta namo mogawas. Pero ilaha ming gitutukan sa ilahang pusil (We just wanted to get out of our dormitory room. But instead they pointed their guns at us),” he said.

Cebu City Councilor David Tumulak, deputy mayor on police matters, belied the claims of the young offenders, saying they were allowed to play basketball last week.

He believed that the riot was merely a diversion so they could escape, he added.

“Ilahang giguba ang padlock ug gipuntirya ang CCTV camera. So naay intent to escape. Nganong gub-on man ang CCTV (They destroyed the padlocks of their room and targeted the CCTV. So there was an intent to escape because if there was none, why did they destroy the CCTV)?” he added.

Another possibility was that the riot was a diversion so they could slip illegal drugs into the facility.

The OSCC has beefed up security measures after a former detainee was caught sneaking back to the facility, bringing small sachets of shabu inserted into the packs of cigarettes placed inside the sack he was bringing.

Tumulak urged the court to hasten the process of transferring seven of the offenders to Cebu City Jail in order to spare the other minor offenders who were bent to change their lives.

Lea Japson, Cebu City Department of Social Welfare and Services (DSWS) head, said Monday’s incident was not the first time that the offenders became unruly and created a commotion to catch attention.

She maintained that the offenders didn’t start a riot but only held a noise barrage to call attention of the need for them to play basketball.

But she admitted that there could be other reasons why the offenders really wanted to go out that day.

She said that since Monday was really their scheduled play time, they may have been planning to smuggle illegal drugs into the adjacent Cebu City Jail — which had been happening in the center since earlier this year.

But then again, she said the situation could have been easily addressed.

“That could have been easily handled by our executive director Merlina Metante. She would just talk to them and they would calm down,” she said.
It was not the first time that the offenders became rowdy.

In August, when all personnel of the OSCC were undergoing a drug testing, the offenders were noisy. Some even shouted that other offenders were trying to escape.

At that time, Japson said Metante also talked it out with the offenders and they calmed down.

On her part, Cebu City Councilor Margarita Osmeña also said she was not surprised with what happened inside the facility yesterday.

She said she talked to Metante about the incident and was also told that the offenders, which she prefers to call as “residents,” just wanted to play basketball.

“But it became under control. These things are going to happen. I’m not surprised. What’s more important is that it can be under control,” she said, adding that after all, these offenders were inside the facility since they broke the law.

Osmeña added that she trusts Metante since she has been in the facility for a long time already even when she was still with the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP).

Osmeña, who is instrumental in the establishment of the OSCC in 2002, said that as long as these commotions don’t happen all the time and for the same reason, there shouldn’t be any problem.

“I don’t know if we can prevent it completely. But we have to minimize. We cannot avoid it. These things are going to happen. We just have to ensure that they are kept at a minimum,” she added.