Trafficking charges set on bar owner, manager

QUALIFIED trafficking charges were filed in court against the owner and manager of a Cebu City bar accused of trading girls and women for sex with customers in exchange for payments.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) recommended the filing of charges against the bar owner and manager of Jaguar KTV bar in barangay Kasambagan, Cebu City and their two cohorts. No bail was recommended.

Asst. State Prosecutor Gilmarie Fe Pacamarra sustained the ruling of the Cebu City Prosecutors’ Office which earlier found probable cause against the accused. “Their denials cannot overcome identification by police and victims,” she said.

Based on surveillance made by the Regional Anti-Human Trafficking Task Force, the victims were paraded to customers who can bring them out for a fee. The police acted as customers in an entrapment operation last April 9, 2011.

The bar owner claimed he sold his share in the club to another person and that he didn’t deal with them. The manager claimed he wasn’t present during the entrapment operation.

The police barged into the Jaguar  KTV Bar at past 9 p.m. last April 9, 2011 and rescued the women and minors who were employed for still unknown jobs there.

The bar owners were nowhere to be found.

A total of 146 women were rescued in the raid spearheaded by the Regional Anti-Human Trafficking Task Force of the Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) in coordination with the DOJ.

Justice Secretary Leila de Lima requested the local police to conduct an operation against Jaguar KTV Bar.

Also present during the raid were the group International Justice Mission (IJM) and the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

Separate charges were filed against a female manager, pimp and the KTV bar cashier. Since some of the victims were minors, the suspects faced charges of “qualified trafficking of persons,” a non-bailable offense.

The special law’s confidentiality provisions prohibit the identification of both the victims and the accused in the media to protect the dignity of the victims.

Human trafficking covers the “recruitment, transportation, transfer or harboring, or receipt of persons with or without the victim’s consent or knowledge” by threats or use of force, or other forms of coercion, abduction, deception.

The Jaguar KTV bar appears on the Philippine Sex Guide website which stated that it is the place where one can meet “some of Cebu’s hottest women.”