REMEMBERING ALDRINNE Aldrinne Pineda’s family marks the 40th day of his death with the suspect in the case, PO2 Omar Malinao of the Raxabago police station, still to be charged in court. Aside from dealing with their son’s loss, Pineda’s parents also want to know why his kidneys were taken out without them being informed by the hospital. —KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING
Five days into the wake of 13-year-old Aldrinne Pineda, his family received a grim package from Tondo Medical Center: His kidneys submerged in formalin in what seemed to be an old coffee container.
“At that time, I had asked Michelle (Pineda’s mother) to go back to the hospital so we could get his medical record,” Pineda’s grandmother, Corazon, told the Inquirer on Sunday. “Then the doctor who gave it to her simply told her: ‘Here are Aldrinne’s organs.’ She didn’t even know it was his kidneys.”
Now, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) wants to know why the doctor who attended to the teenager took his kidneys out.
“We want to hear the doctor’s side. According to the boy’s mother, Aldrinne’s kidneys were removed without her consent,” said Jun Nalangan, CHR-National Capital Region investigator-on-case.
He added that he expected Michelle to formally file her complaint within the week.
As soon as it is received by the CHR, the agency will subpoena the doctor concerned. Pineda’s family has asked the CHR for help in getting justice for his death.
The Grade 6 student was rushed to Tondo Medical Center on the night of March 2 after he was shot by PO2 Omar Malinao of the Raxabago police station in Tondo, Manila.
Shot by accident
Malinao had claimed that he was running after a group of looters at the Vitas slaughterhouse complex when he “tripped and accidentally pulled the trigger” of his Glock 9 mm pistol.
A single bullet hit Pineda, who was hanging out with a friend nearby, in the stomach.
The boy died the following day but not before telling his father that a policeman had shot him.
Too immersed in their grief, the family was perplexed about the package but did not question the doctor’s action.
“At that time, we thought it was all part of normal hospital procedures. Maybe it was part of Aldrinne’s surgery. In any case, nobody had bothered to explain,” Corazon said.
But having been at the hospital during Pineda’s confinement, she recalled that when the hospital was cleaning his body, his stomach “was unusually bloated.”
Unexpected discovery
It wasn’t until the CHR conducted a reautopsy of Pineda’s body that the puzzle pieces fell into place.
“The doctor suddenly asked us: ‘Where are Aldrinne’s kidneys?’” Corazon recalled.
The family was just as surprised.
“We didn’t know his kidneys were gone. All this time, we kept the container we got from the hospital inside his casket.”
Corazon added that during the first autopsy done by Tondo Medical Center, they were not informed that the boy’s organs were missing.
“The hospital also did not tell us they would be extracting organs from his body,” she said.
Nalangan said that a CHR doctor made the discovery two or three days before Pineda’s burial on March 14.
“We were surprised when the family informed us that the kidneys were in a jar tucked under the coffin. We asked them: ‘Why?’ They told us that the organs were removed by the hospital without their permission,” he added.
Not the usual procedure
“This is the reason why we would like to launch an investigation because our doctor said that is not the proper procedure,” Nalangan said.
“The hospital reportedly told the family that the kidney was grazed by the bullet that hit Aldrinne so it had to be removed. The question is: Do the [kidneys] really belong to Aldrinne Pineda?” he stressed.
Malinao, meanwhile, is facing a charge of murder in the Manila City Prosecutor’s Office.