A throng of people wait on Monday, March 18, outside the Lapu-Lapu City Hall of Justice to a get a glimpse of the suspect in the killing of a 16-year-old church volunteer. | Tonee Despojo
LAPU-LAPU CITY, Cebu — It was not only one family but also the people in Lapu-Lapu City that expressed rage against the 17-year-old boy, who is now tagged as the suspect in the gruesome killing of 16-year-old Christine Lee Silawan.
As officials from the National Bureau of Investigation in Central Visayas (NBI-7) filed a murder complaint against the suspect, a minor, a throng of people trooped in front of the Lapu-Lapu City Prosecutor’s Office on Monday afternoon, March 18. They wanted to take a glimpse of the young man supposedly behind the killing of the young church volunteer.
They shouted in rage and some even attempted to hit the suspect as he passed by them, as he was escorted by the agents of NBI-7, after the filing of the case.
Arjean Pacquiao, a resident of Barangay Maribago, was one of the those who waited for the suspect outside the Lapu-Lapu City Hall of Justice. For the 30-year-old mother, the incident merits the re-imposition of the death penalty in the country.
“Bisan pa og 17 o menor de edad, dili na dapat mo-matter ang edad kay ang uban magsalig mobuhat og krimen kay dili mapriso,” Pacquaio said.
(Even if he is 17 or a minor, age should not matter (with regard to imposing the death penalty) because others would commit crime because they would not be imprisoned (for being a minor).)
“Dapat unta kung unsa iyang gibuhat sa babaye, mao sab ang buhaton niya kay dili gyud maayo ang iyang gibuhat. Unsa may sala sa babayi nga ingon anaon pagpatay unsa may bug-at nga rason?” she added.
(What he did to the victim, should also be done to him because what he did was not right. What is the fault of the girl that she would be killed that way? What is the reason?)
Silawan, a grade 9 student of Maribago National High School, was found dead at a vacant lot in Barangay Bankal exactly a week ago. She was half-naked, half of her face was skinned to the bone, and some internal organs were missing.
The young girl’s death caught the interest of the national and global community that a bounty totaling to P2 million was raised for the arrest of the person behind her death. The amount came from the Lapu-Lapu City government (P1 million), a foreign national based in Leyte (P500,000), the Cebu Provincial Council for the Welfare of Children (P200,000), and the Police Regional Advisory Council (P100,000), Presidential Assistant to the Visayas Michael Dino (P100,000) and Philippine Postal Corp. Chairman Norman Fulgencio (P100,000).
Lawyer Dominador Cimafranca, NBI-7 assistant regional director, however, said that they were not privy on where the reward money would go.
NBI-7 conducted a parallel investigation on the case and obtained 11 CCTV footage from different establishments from near the Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish, where Silawan served as a Mass collector on March 10, up to a village near an access road heading to the vacant lot where Silawan’s body was discovered on March 11.
Cimafranca, during the presentation of their investigation results, assured that they had a strong case against the suspect considering the circumstantial evidence, both CCTV and accounts of eyewitnesses, that would support their findings.
A panel of prosecutors was already formed to further investigate Silawan’s case and to decide whether the murder complaint against the suspect should be elevated to the courts./dbs