Yolanda ‘looters’ caught but nobody is filing charges

AP FILE PHOTO

TACLOBAN CITY, Leyte, Philippines — Although the police have caught over 100 suspects in the massive looting of various establishments in this city that began just hours after it was hit by supertyphoon Yolanda (Haiyan) on November 8, no complainant has filed charges against them.

A total of 112 persons, some of them minors, believed to have been involved in or caught in the act of looting were arrested since November 11, said

SPO4 Ignacio Amescua, chief investigator of the Tacloban City Police Office.

Amescua explained that they immediately released the looting suspects who were minors but confiscated the goods in their possession. Some of the

seized items still had price tags bearing the name of the establishment where they were taken.

Amescua said policemen went around the city on the lookout for persons in possession of looted items.  If persons carrying goods failed to show official receipts or sales invoices, they were immediately held for questioning.

He said suspects of legal age were detained and police seized the stolen goods.

However, the police had to let them go after the 18-hour reglamentary period since there were no complainants, Amescua said.

“Owners of the stolen items should file the complaints. We just apprehend the suspects,” he explained.

The confiscated items that included clothes, cable wires, liquor, bed foam

and appliances, among others, are kept at the Tacloban City police office.

Amescua said that they would keep the items until these were claimed by the

owner-establishments.

Massive looting occurred in Tacloban City barely 24 hours after the city was ravaged by supertyphoon Yolanda in the morning of November 8.

Looters ransacked big business establishments in the city, including shopping malls, rice warehouses and drugstores. The looters did not just take food and clothing but some carted away appliances such as television sets, refrigerators and even air conditioning units.