CITY OF SAN FERNANDO—A fugitive from the law for the past six days, retired Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan Jr. is besieged on many fronts.
The National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police are after Palparan to make him and three others stand trial for the kidnapping of two University of the Philippines students in Hagonoy, Bulacan, in June 2006.
Now, even the Armed Forces of the Philippines is helping hunt the man tagged by activist groups as “Berdugo” (Butcher), for the scores of activists and ordinary citizens killed, abducted and injured during his tour of duty.
“We will try our very best to help arrest him in support of the PNP,” Lt. Gen. Jessie Dellosa, the AFP chief of staff, said in a phone interview from Davao City on Friday.
Asked to confirm if the military was helping track down Palparan, Dellosa said: “Since he is a fugitive, he can be arrested. We can assist the PNP through the joint peace and security coordinating center.”
Dellosa also said the military had complied with the request of the Department of Justice to be on the lookout for the fugitive and to prevent him from leaving the country. “So far, we’ve published lookout bulletins,” he said.
On Dec. 19, warrants for the arrest of Palparan and three others were issued by Bulacan Regional Trial Court Judge Teodora Gonzales in connection with the 2006 kidnapping of UP students Sherlyn Cadapan and Karen Empeño.
The AFP provost marshal had helped arrest two of the coaccused, Lt. Col. Felipe Anotado and S/Sgt. Edgardo Osorio. Both active in the service, the two were remanded to police custody in Camp Crame on Dec. 20.
M/Sgt. Rizal Hilario, the third coaccused, is at large like Palparan.
Hilario is said to be Palparan’s right-hand man. He used a number of aliases, former Bulacan Gov. Josefina de la Cruz said in an interview after five residents of San Jose del Monte City went missing in 2005.
Palparan had earlier said he should not be charged with kidnapping because he was not a private person but an Army commander when Cadapan and Empeño went missing. He retired as commander of the 7th Infantry Division in Central Luzon in September 2006.
Surrender
In Manila, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said that the government had received “several surrender feelers” from Palparan, and that he might just be waiting for the yearend holidays to pass before finally surrendering to authorities.
“My appeal is for him to submit himself to the authorities at the soonest [time]. He should confront the charges against him and face the trial before the court,” De Lima said in an interview.
“In the meantime, the manhunt continues even if he has sent his feelers,” she said.
Palparan was to have surrendered to authorities on Friday, as claimed by NBI Central Luzon Director Ricardo Diaz on a purported tip. But he did not show up.
But the NBI spokesperson, Cecilio Zamora, yesterday said in a phone interview that he had yet to confirm where the tip came from.
Zamora said that he could not reach Diaz by phone, and that the surrender rumors remained “negative.”
“But the manhunt is ongoing,” he said.
Zamora also said that when he spoke to Diaz’s assistant regional director, Roland Agrabioso, the latter denied that their office had received any formal information that Palparan would surrender to the NBI.
De Lima said it was unclear when Palparan would turn himself in. “He said he would surrender soon, but as to when exactly, that was not said. It’s good that we have these feelers,” she said.
According to De Lima, surrendering will not only give Palparan the chance to answer the charges against him but also save the government time and resources in going after him.
“If he chooses to become a fugitive, then we will try all available options, like offering a reward for information that would lead to his capture,” she said.
Don’t trust him
De Lima said Palparan was assured of being “accorded due process and treated fairly.”
“The case is already with the courts,” she pointed out.
But Commission on Human Rights Chair Loretta Ann Rosales and human rights lawyer Edre Olalia said Palparan was not to be trusted.
“It could probably be a ruse to deflect attention,” Olalia, secretary general of the National Union of People’s Lawyers handling the cases of Empeño and Cadapan, said of Palparan’s purported offer to surrender.
“He’s biding his time. He probably has some dirty plan to execute an escape,” Olalia added.
Rosales said the NBI was “naïve” and “short-sighted” to believe in Palparan’s word.
“You don’t rely on the word of someone who knows he’s ready to be arrested and there’s a lot of evidence against him,” she said in an interview by phone.
“They can’t trust him; they should not trust him. His whole performance of duty was a concretization of why people should not trust him. He had no accountability. He took shortcuts to do his job. He violated human rights,” she added.
Rosales also said that with his network of friends in the military, Palparan could always hide and escape, and that it would be prudent for the government “to mobilize all its forces to try to get him.”
“No stone should be left unturned,” she said.
Olalia said it was difficult to trust Palparan given his “proven track record of being cunning and misleading people and lying through his teeth.”
“If the surrender feeler is true, why not? But until that happens, the burden is on him to disprove that he can be believed at all,” Olalia said on the phone.
Under surveillance
Rosales said the NBI should have kept an eye on Palparan from the time immigration authorities stopped him from leaving the country on Dec. 19.
“They should have made sure that he was under surveillance, and within their grasp,” she said. “I feel bad that he’s at large, and we’re an archipelago, and that he still has friends within the Armed Forces.”
Olalia made the same observation: “From [Diosdado Macapagal International Airport in Pampanga], they should have put him under surveillance. That time, he was a potential fugitive from justice. There was an opportunity that was missed. Now they’re scrambling to find him.”
“I’m not trying to cast aspersions. I hope the missed opportunity will not be repeated.” With a report from Jaymee T. Gamil
First posted 9:47 pm | Saturday, December 24th, 2011