Labella: Cebu City will be relentless in going after sex offenders

Cebu City Mayor Edgar Labella. | CDN file photo

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Cebu City Mayor Edgardo Labella is calling on the police and other law enforcement agencies to be more aggressive in tracking down sex offenders and putting a stop to this global crime.

Labella made the call amid the recent arrest in Cebu City of a Cebuano, whom the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol) considered as one of the most wanted sex offenders in Europe for child abuse and exploitation.

“We will give instructions to the police to be very relentless against sex offenders the way we are very relentless against criminality and the fight against illegal drugs. We have to be relentless against sex trafficking,” said Labella.

He said that he was saddened to learn that a sex offender, who had abused at least eight children in various circumstances and had been involved in a massive global crime, could be hiding in an unexpected barangay such as Barangay Luz in Cebu City.

But he said that he was happy that the culprit was caught and brought to justice so that it would serve as an example to other sex offenders hiding in the city that the city government was serious in putting a stop to this global crime.

Read more: Europe’s most wanted sex offender caught in Cebu, 8 rescued

He also warned those foreigners, who are in the city and are involved in online sex trafficking that the city would be relentless in going after them.

“Their stay here in the Philippines is not just a right but a mere privilege and if they do that (sex trafficking), of course, it is an aggravating circumstance that they abuse the hospitality we have given them,” said Labella.

On April 12, 2019, the National Bureau of Investigation -Anti-Human Trafficking Division (NBI- AHTRAD) and the Philippine National Police – Women and Children Protection Center (PNP-WCPC) arrested, Nelson Siacor Torayno, 32, one of the most wanted sex offenders in Europe for child abuse and exploitation.

He was arrested at his rented room where thousands of images, including videos depicting children being sexually abused by an adult, were found in his possession.

Torayno has been producing and distributing child sexual exploitation materials (CSEM) on the dark-web and has abused children in the process.

He faces charges of possession of CSEM with intent to sell, distribute, publish or broadcast, committed through the use of information communications technology.

At least eight children, including five from Cebu City, whose ages range from 3 to 11, were rescued. They had been reintegrated back to their families and would continue to receive trauma-informed interventions. /dbs