QCPD chief: Law too weak for car theft, fencing gangs

The chief of the Quezon City Police District along with an anticrime watchdog group renewed calls for Congress to make car theft and fencing nonbailable offenses, saying amendments are needed to keep elusive and moneyed men like alleged crime boss Mac Lester Reyes in jail.

QCPD director Chief Supt. Richard Albano aired the appeal in Tuesday’s press conference announcing the arrest of Reyes and four alleged members of his crime syndicate. Reyes, who was captured in Caloocan City on Aug. 13 after a yearlong manhunt, was ordered arrested by the local court in Bulacan province for car theft and illegal possession of firearms.

Reyes was tagged as the leader of a car theft group that had been operating for years in Metro Manila, with his cousin Joemel Salvatierra, son Mark Joseph and wife Jasmin as members. Jasmin and Joseph were killed in an ambush in February shortly after leaving the Quezon City courthouse, while Salvatierria was arrested the following month in Caloocan for a gun possession charge also filed in Bulacan.

The QCPD said 10 stolen vehicles were recovered from the Reyes-led group, along with a grenade and several sachets of  “shabu.”

“This is the nth time the PNP (Philippine National Police) is making this call. We have difficulties because the laws are weak and outdated. Imagine the antifencing law: Even if the perpetrators face such a charge on several counts, they can afford bail. Same with car theft, they can easily afford to post bail,” Albano told reporters.

A Quezon City ordinance, he said, bans surplus car parts shops on Banawe Avenue from selling items from unknown or dubious sources. “But it would be better if nobody bought them. We hope such laws are given more teeth so that no one would dare buy these things.”

In the same press conference, Arsenio Evangelista, whose son Venson was killed by members of a car theft gang, supported Albano’s call.

“The carnapping law should be strengthened by making the offense nonbailable. Otherwise, the perpetrators just become repeat offenders. They know they can easily play with the law,” said Evangelista, who came as a representative for the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption.

“It’s time to level-up the law since it’s already more than 40 years old. There are a lot of organized crime groups now who have good lawyers, connections with public officials and law enforcers.”

Evangelista and Albano are pinning their hopes on House Bill 4544, which revises the 1972 antitheft law. Filed in 2011, it was passed on second reading at the House of Representatives on June 4.

The bill made carnapping nonbailable by raising the penalty to 40 years of imprisonment, instead of just 30 years at the maximum, if the theft was done with violence and the victim was killed, Evangelista said.