2 MPD commanders, 4 others relieved over torture

MANILA, Philippines - Two station commanders of the Manila Police District (MPD) and four other police officers were ordered relieved after they were charged for the torture of a robbery suspect inside a police precinct in Tondo, Manila.

National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief Director Leocadio Santiago ordered the relief of Superintendent Rogelio Rosales, chief of the MPD Station 1; Superintendent Ernesto Tendero Jr., commander of police Station 11; Senior Police Officer 3 Joaquin de Guzman; SPO1 Burt Tupaz; SPO1 Dante Bautista, and PO1 Nonito Binayug.

Rosales and Tendero were reassigned to the MPD headquarters while De Guzman, Tupaz, Bautista, and Binayug were ordered to report to the NCRPO’s holding center.

Tendero was then commander of MPD station 2, which has jurisdiction over the Asuncion police community precinct (PCP) at the time robbery suspect Darius Evangelista was allegedly tortured by Senior Inspector Joselito Binayug.

Rosales was accused after initial investigation showed that the victim was first brought to his station where the latter was also possibly tortured.

De Guzman, Tupaz, Bautista, and Nonito Binayug reportedly witnessed the torture inside the Asuncion precinct last March 5.

Chief Superintendent Roberto Rongavilla, head of Task Force Asuncion, said Rosales and Tendero were included in the Anti-Torture Act of 2009 charges filed against Binayug and his co-accused before the Department of Justice (DOJ) for command responsibility.

“The regional director of the NCRPO has issued orders on the relief of Rosales and Tendero and four other enlisted personnel named in the charge sheet. It is now up to the MPD leadership to implement it,” said Rongavilla.

Rongavilla said Binayug arrested Evangelista last March 5 in Tondo on robbery charges.

Binayug brought Evangelista to the Station 11 detention center where fellow robbers identified as Renato Peralta, 30; Emmanuel Miranda, 37, and Sommy Lim, 29, were also detained.

Witnesses claimed that Binayug had started torturing Evangelista at Station 11, and then the police official left.

Binayug returned later and took custody of Evangelista, who was brought to the Asuncion precinct, where the torture video was taken with a cell phone.

The video was leaked to media and aired on local television.

Lim, one of Evangelista’s fellow detainees at Station 11, was shown the video and he identified Binayug as the man wearing a white t-shirt, shorts and sandals, the same attire he was in when he fetched Evangelista from the police station.

Rongavilla said they were able to trace the three detainees that turned witnesses at the Manila City jail after a review of the police blotter of Station 11.

Investigators took the statements of the three detainees, which were the basis of the charges filed against Binayug and the other policemen.

Superintendent Matthew Perlas Baccay, head of the NCRPO’s regional investigation and detective management division, claimed they identified Evangelista as the torture victim based on the description of his wife Margie who is now under the protective custody of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR).

“We established that the video was taken last March and several other alleged torture (incidents) happened only recently. Besides, Mrs. Evangelista claimed that the man was her husband because of his tattoo and other distinguishing marks,” said Baccay.

Meanwhile, Binayug and the other accused policemen were subjected to a drug test yesterday at the Camp Crame Hospital in Quezon City.