Fiscals insist cult leader detained woman

CEBU, Philippines - Alleged cult leader Casiano Apduhan Jr. alias Tatay Boy detained Emma Nepomuceno in his house in Balamban town.

This was the statement of Eleuterio Repuela before the court yesterday during the hearing of the case against Apduhan. Repuela is the father of the 15-year-old boy whose remains were found in a 30-foot tunnel under Apduhan’s house during the operation last March that “rescued” Nepomuceno.

Repuela said he concluded that Nepomuceno might have been detained because she was always in a room at the second floor of the house and he could hear her cry each time he was there.  He said he was ordered to bring her food and water and the room was padlocked.

He admitted, though, that he was not able to ask the woman why she was crying.

What Repuela told the court, however, ran contrary to Nepomuceno’s statement that she was free to go and was not barred from leaving the house. Nepomuceno also told the press that the Apduhan couple treated her like their daughter and it was her choice to stay in the house.

Repuela told the court that they moved to Balamban from Naga City in 2011 after Apduhan convinced them that staying with him was the only way to be saved when the world ends in 2013. They reportedly worked for Apduhan without compensation but they were given free food.

Heddah Largo, consultant of the Provincial Women’s Commission, said the prosecution was supposed to present two witnesses but they could not let the psychologist take the stand yesterday because of unavailability of documents.

Largo said the psychologist was supposed to testify that Nepomuceno is suffering from Stockholm syndrome or the “psychological tendency of a hostage to bond with, identify with, or sympathize with his or her captor.”

Despite contradicting Nepomuceno’s statement, Largo is convinced that what Repuela told the court would be enough to prove that Apduhan detained Nepomuceno.

Failure

Apduhan’s lawyer, Danilo Yap, said Repuela’s statement failed to overturn Nepomuceno’s categorical statement to court in the previous hearing of the case that she was not detained.

Yap said the psychologist the prosecution intends to present is incompetent because she reportedly did not examine or confront Nepomuceno personally.

Nepomuceno’s mother, Alicia, and sister, Gina, also said that the supposed victim was not detained.

On March 26, 2014, Apduhan and his driver Victor Fajardo were arrested by members of the National Bureau of Investigation-7 by virtue of a warrant intended to exhume the boy’s body and to rescue Nepomuceno who was reportedly detained for the past five years. — /JMO (FREEMAN)