FOUR-year-old Bladen Skyler Abatayo was laid to rest on Saturday more than a week after he was hit by a stray bullet during a botched police operation in Barangay Ermita, Cebu City.
Hundreds of Abatayo’s family members, friends, and supporters marched from the boy’s neighborhood to the Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish-Recoletos where a Requiem Mass was held at 1 p.m.
The funeral procession proceeded to the Carreta Cemetery where people bade him goodbye.
As the boy’s casket was placed inside the niche, people shouted, “Hustisya! Hustisya! (Justice),” reverberating the family’s call to penalize those involved in the killing.
Most of those who joined the funeral wore black and white shirts while some brought balloons with a statement that read “Justice for Skyler.”
“Hustisya ra gyud ang among gipangayo alang sa akong anak. (All we want is justice for my son),” said the boy’s father Marc Anthony.
Abatayo was studying inside his room past 1 p.m. on July 10 when a bullet suddenly pierced his chest.
Senior Insp. John Kareen Escober, chief of the Carbon Police Station, earlier explained that four of his operatives responded to a tip from a concerned citizen that four men were having a pot session at an abandoned house beside Abatayos’ home.
Escober said one of the policemen grappled with one of the drug suspects who pointed a gun at them.
According to the police, the bullet that killed Bladen Skyler was from the gun of one of the drug suspects.
Abatayo’s neighbors, however, refuted the police’s claim and said one of the police slipped causing his gun to fire.
The four policemen were subjected to a paraffin test about 48 hours after the incident happened. They also submitted their service firearms for ballistic examination.
Both tests turned out negative but the parents of Abatayo doubted the results. Marc Anthony turned over the bullet that hit his son to the National Bureau of Investigation which is conducting a probe on the incident.
The four policemen who took part in the operation were relieved by Philippine National Police chief Director General Oscar Albayalde.
During the Requiem Mass, Fr. Ricardo Pitogo called on Abatayo’s family not to take revenge and to let the investigation take its course.
“Let us not answer violence with violence. Rather, let us stand up for peace,” he said in his homily.
“Skyler is now an angel. He’s going to God. Let us pray that no other children will die. May we all find lesson from this incident,” he added.
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