An absentee prisons director
What’s so special about Director Franklin Bucayu of the Bureau of Corrections that he can’t be removed from his post despite his inability to run the national prisons system?
Bucayu is so inept that prison guards and officials who collude with drug lords run circles around him and make fun of him behind his back.
It had to take Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, his big boss, to raid the compound within the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) where convicted drug lords were confined, when he could have done that himself.
Bucayu is a retired police general, but he’s no match to the wile of convicted drug lords.
That raid revealed the luxurious lifestyle within the prison walls of these drug lords who ran their respective drug syndicates by remote control.
My sources in the corrections bureau say Bucayu is seldom seen at the official residence of the prisons director within the NBP compound, much more so in his office.
In short, he’s an absentee director.
* * *
When the cat is away the mice play, according to a popular proverb.
And since Bucayu is an absentee director, his corrupt subordinates have the run of the entire bureau.
Last week, Ruben Tiu, a convicted drug lord, was caught selling methamphetamine hydrochloride (street name: shabu) outside Sablayan Penal Colony in Occidental Mindoro by agents of the National Bureau of Investigation who posed as buyers.
Tiu was with three prison guards who acted as escorts, one of whom was arrested with him; the two others escaped.
Tiu was supposed to be inside the Sablayan prison.
Upon Investigation, Tiu confessed he bought the shabu—worth P1 million—would you believe, from a supplier right inside the NBP in Muntinlupa City!
So the drug syndicate within the NBP, which was believed busted during De Lima’s raid last year, is still thriving.
I wonder what’s De Lima’s reason for still retaining Bucayu this time around?
* * *
On Oct. 8, 2007, Gerry Caballes and John Christopher Añonuevo were waiting for their friends outside a bar in Binangonan town, Rizal province, when policemen got down from their cars and pointed their guns at the two men.
Raising their hands to show they were not guilty of doing anything, the two said they were not criminals and identified themselves as barrio folk of the town. Without rhyme or reason, the cops fired at the two men.
Añonuevo died instantly from multiple gunshot wounds.
Caballes, although hit just below his heart, was able to run away.
The cops continued to fire at him, hitting him in the back and legs, but he was able to escape under cover of darkness.
Caballes, who has no criminal record, filed criminal and administrative cases against his assailants—Insp. Alfredo Lim, PO1 Andres Salazar, PO1 Arnel Diocena, PO1 Renson Calacion and PO1 Roberet Ariaso.
The frustrated murder case he filed against the cops in 2008 was downgraded to a much lesser offense of frustrated homicide by the Rizal Prosecutor’s Office.
Anonuevo’s parents, after many postponements of the criminal case in court and the administrative case at the National Police Commission (Napolcom), decided not to pursue the charges and migrated to the United States.
Gerry Caballes has been left alone to seek justice in the Binangonan court and the Napolcom in Manila.
The Napolcom has been hearing the administrative case since 2008, and there seems to be no end in sight, Caballes said.
Larry Caballes, Gerry’s father who’s in his early 60s, came to see me at my radio program “Isumbong Mo kay Tulfo” to complain against the footdragging by the Napolcom of the case against the cops.
