No Witness, No Body, But They Say: Man threw son overboard

Would a father have the heart to throw his physically challenged son overboard and leave him to drown then flee the scene?

This was the buzz at the port area early yesterday morning after a ship from Baybay, Leyte docked at Pier 3 while the rain poured.

While people were waiting for the rain to cease, a man was seen carrying his 11-year-old son to the rear of inter-island vessel.  The next thing they knew, it was believed that the boy, who is a polio victim, was thrown off the ship by the man.

In the ensuing commotion, the man reportedly fled as the ship’s crew moved to do a rescue operation.

The efforts failed and so did that the Coastguard that sent BRP Batangas and deployed rubber boats with frogmen to scour the waters around Piers 1 to 3.

There was no trace of the alleged victim. 

A woman, who occupied a cot near the father and son, told radio station dyAB, that the man claimed that he and the boy were heading to Roxas City after his wife abandoned them to go with another man.

What puzzles the authorities is that nobody has really come forward to say that he or she witnessed the boy being thrown overboard.

The Philippine Coastguard Cebu Station however still sent its personnel, but the search and rescue effort yielded negative results as of press time.

Coastguard Station Cebu however identified the man and his child in its report to the district operations division based on the ship’s manifest, but The Freeman is withholding their identities until authorities can really be sure that there was indeed a boy thrown overboard. — Edwin Ian Melecio/NLQ