Relatives of victims of the Atimonan, Quezon shooting visit the site during the 1st year anniversary. INQUIRER SOUTHERN LUZON
ATIMONAN, Quezon—The family of Tirso Lontok Jr., one of the 13 victims of the “Atimonan rubout,” lit candles and prayed at the site of the killings along Maharlika Highway here on Sunday, seeking heaven’s intercession as they continued to fight for justice for his death and those of the others at the hands of law enforcers a year ago today (Monday).
The grieving family members, all wearing white T-shirts printed with their demand for justice, not only prayed for the departed, but also begged heaven to remind President Aquino of his promise that justice would be done for the victims.
Tirso Lontok Sr., 74, urged Aquino to fulfill his promise to give justice to his son, a known environmentalist in Quezon province and a Mt. Banahaw protection advocate.
“Give justice to my son,” the elder Lontok said, wiping away tears, in an interview after the prayers that lasted 45 minutes.
Some passing motorists slowed down, rolled down their windows and made signs of the cross in sympathy.
“My son was a good person. Why did they kill him?” the old man said.
Lontok Jr. was also a real estate agent and he was traveling on business with 12 other men when policemen and soldiers raked the group’s vehicles with gunfire at a checkpoint in Lumutan village in this town on Jan. 6 last year.
‘Coplan: Armado’
The law enforcers were after Victor “Vic” Siman, an alleged operator of the numbers racket “jueteng” in Southern Tagalog to whom Lontok was trying to sell an apartment in Laguna. Siman was among those killed.
Supt. Hansel Marantan, the leader of the police team and then deputy chief for intelligence of the Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) police, claimed the 12 men were killed in a shootout, and that Siman and his group were a jueteng and guns-for-hire syndicate.
The police operation against Siman’s group was called “Coplan: Armado,” which received P100,000 in financing from the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC).
But an investigation by the Department of Justice and the National Bureau of Investigation found that there was no shootout.
Rubout, not shootout
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said the investigation found that the killings were a “rubout.”
On March 11 last year, on orders from the President, the NBI filed multiple murder charges against Marantan and 14 policemen who carried out the operation against Siman and 11 soldiers from the Philippine Army’s Special Forces who backed up the police team.
The NBI also brought charges of obstruction of justice against eight policemen and a soldier.
All the suspects are in jail.
Lontok’s sister, Belle Lontok-Evangelista, said her family had been waiting for President Aquino to fulfill his promise to punish the killers.
“We hope that before his (Aquino’s) term ends, the killers [will] all [be] languishing in Muntinlupa,” Evangelista said, referring to the national penitentiary New Bilibid Prison.
Way out for suspects
Lontok Sr. said he feared a way out would be found for the suspects after Aquino stepped down in 2016.
Lontok Jr.’s widow, Marife, their three children and some family members lit white candles in a roadside ditch where Lontok’s body was found riddled with bullets.
The family put up at the site a tarpaulin sign with Lontok’s image and a message calling for justice for the victims, who have since become collectively known as the Atimonan 13.
The Lontok family traveled here in three vehicles from Dolores, Quezon, their hometown at the foot of Mt. Banahaw.
“With the slow wheels of justice, we’re still feeling the agony and pain of his loss,” Marife said, sobbing and hugging Faith, the youngest of their three children.
The two older children, Bianca and Timothy, stood beside her.
The widow complained that the suspects had yet to be arraigned. “What is taking them so long?” she asked.
Marife said state prosecutors from the justice department did not attend the first hearing in November presided over by Judge Maria Chona Pulgar-Navarro of Regional Trial Court Branch 61 in Gumaca, Quezon.
“We urge them to attend the next hearing for the sake of justice that they have all vowed to serve,” Marife said.
‘Powerful, influential’
Marife said the wife of one of the suspects, Supt. Ramon Balauag, former head of the Quezon police intelligence unit, worked at the justice department as a state prosecutor.
Lontok Sr. described the suspects led by Marantan as “powerful and influential.”
“They may be in jail now but they can still do everything to influence the case in their favor,” he said.
To Marantan and the other suspects, Marife had this to say: “Look at what you all have done. You made us all orphans. The families of some of your victims are now living in poverty…. All of you should rot in jail. To you, Marantan, not every day is Christmas. Your own time will come.”
Marife said she had been in touch with the families of some of the victims who had wanted to join the commemoration at the site of the killings.
The other families backed out due to lack of money, she said.
“Some of their loved ones are sick and they have no money for medicine. They can’t even attend court hearings because they cannot afford the fare,” she said.
The victims
Aside from Lontok and Siman, the others killed in Atimonan were Gerry Ancero Siman and Conrado Redresca Decillo, all of Calamba City; Victor Garcia Gonzales, of Candaba, Pampanga; Jimbeam Dyico Justiniani of Quezon City; Paul Acedillo Quiohilag of Biñan, Laguna; Supt. Alfredo Perez Consemino, then acting group director of the Regional Headquarters Support Group of Mimaropa (Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon and Palawan), and his escorts P01 Jeffrey Tarinay Valdez and SP01 Gruet Alinea Mantuano; S/Sgt. Armando Aranda Lescano, an Army soldier; and Leonardo Catapang Marasigan and Maximo Manalastas Pelayo.
Melinda, Lontok’s eldest sister, said the families of some of the victims had been evicted from their houses for failing to pay rent.
“Lescano’s family has yet to receive even a single centavo from the claims that they filed. One of his children is also suffering from cancer but can’t afford to buy medicines,” she said.
The widow of Quiohilag had been operated for a tumor in the head, she said. “His (Quiohilag’s) sister is a banana cue vendor, but she’s saving up to be able to attend court hearings,” she said.
Not sanctioned
Senior Supt. Wilben Mayor, a spokesman for the Philippine National Police, said on Sunday that lessons had been learned from the Atimonan rubout case.
But the charges filed against the policemen involved did not affect police operations against criminals, Mayor said in a phone interview. “It also led to an internal cleansing in the PNP,” he said.
Mayor said the actions of the policemen charged for the killings “did not reflect the behavior and principles of the PNP as an organization.”
The alleged summary execution of the Atimonan 13, he said, was not sanctioned by the PNP, but a “personal decision of those involved.”
“What they did violated our existing police operational procedures, policies, and rules and regulations. It was against our system of laws,” Mayor said.
Since the Atimonan killings, he said, the PNP has instituted reforms to prevent similar killings involving policemen.—With a report from Marlon Ramos in Manila
Originally posted: 9:15 pm | Sunday, January 5th, 2014
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