ANGRY CUSTOMER TURNS SHEEPISH SUSPECT Encinas at the Manila police headquarters on Friday. NIÑO JESUS ORBETA
The young businessman who was caught on security cameras assaulting the female cashier of an eatery in Manila during a heated exchange over payment was arrested and charged on orders of Mayor Alfredo Lim on Friday.
The incident was being tackled in a barangay mediation hearing Thursday afternoon when a team sent by Lim walked in and picked up John Paul Encinas, a 27-year-old laundry shop owner.
“Abuse of women and children has no place in the city,” Lim said in a statement seeking the prosecution of Encinas for assaulting Marjorie Reynaldo on Sunday. The incident was caught on video that was shown on GMA 7 Thursday night.
The footage, taken inside the eatery where Reynaldo worked on P. Ocampo Street, showed Encinas splashing water on the woman and then throwing the emptied bottle at her.
It also showed Encinas yanking her shirt by the collar till she hit the counter. He then went to the other side of the counter and tried to stuff peso bills into Reynaldo’s mouth.
Apologetic, Encinas later claimed in a media interview that Reynaldo was being rude to him as though he was not paying for the food he ordered. He said it all started when he told her that he would just get the money from his car parked outside.
Encinas’s father expressed regret over the incident on Friday and said his son was ready to face the consequences of his actions.
Raymond Encinas, however, decried the way Mayor Lim entered the picture when an effort was being made to resolve the matter at the barangay level.
The elder Encinas said his son and Reynaldo were in the middle of a mediation hearing presided over by Barangay 719 chair Renato Osmena at the barangay hall on Thursday afternoon when a team from the City Hall Special Operations Group headed by former police Insp. Mar Reyes arrived.
He said Reyes and his men picked up his son and gave their word that he was just being “invited” to the City Hall. “We were deceived,” he said. “(My son) was brought instead to the police station where he was booked.”
“We are aware of what my son has done. He has asked for forgiveness and is ready to face the consequences, but for political ends Mayor Lim arbitrarily ordered the arrest of my son without proper charges,” the elder Encinas told the Inquirer in an interview at the Manila Police District headquarters.
“We are now afraid because we are criticizing Mayor Lim,” he said. “But there’s due process. A hearing in the barangay was ongoing and the victim was also there. The mayor should not use us for political gain. We have committed a mistake and we are sorry. Lim is trying to win brownie points at our expense.”
Interviewed at the MPD headquarters on Friday, John Paul Encinas said, “Reyes stopped the proceedings and told me that I was being invited to City Hall to see Mayor Lim, but I was not brought there. I was instead brought to the MPD headquarters on UN Avenue where I was booked and where they took my mug shots and fingerprints.”
SPO1 James Poso, the officer on case, said Encinas, who remained in detention Friday night, was charged with unjust vexation, slight physical injuries and slander. With a report from Erika Sauler