Rape ‘victim’ files kidnap charges vs nun, 3 priests

ILOILO CITY – A 25-year-old woman, who earlier accused an assistant parish priest in Iloilo of rape, has filed charges of kidnapping and obstruction of justice against a nun and three other priests.

In a three-page affidavit, the woman alleged that Sister Serafica Tolentino and Fathers Robert Amalay, Neil Antenor Cruz and Ramon Masculino detained her in a religious school for five days and coerced her not to file rape charges against Fr. Martin Alarcon.

Talk of the alleged kidnapping cropped up last week when the woman filed two counts of rape against Alarcon, assistant parish priest in Carles town.

Cruz, however, denied kidnapping or preventing the woman from filing the rape case, saying that they merely offered assistance to her.

Lawyer Cynette Mirasol said in a radio interview that there could not have been any kidnapping since the woman was free to move and was allowed to use her cellular phone.

"She always had her mobile phone with her," Mirasol said.

Her face covered with a piece of cloth and accompanied by her lawyer, Edeljulio Romero, the woman filed her complaint for serious illegal detention and obstruction of justice against Tolentino and the three priests with the city prosecutor’s office yesterday morning.

Romero sought a preliminary investigation on the complaint and the filing of the appropriate charges in court if the evidence warrants.

The complainant alleged that on Feb. 15, the nun and three priests brought her to the Assumption Convent on Gen. Luna street here to keep her away from the media.

At first, she said she was convinced that the group only wanted to help her. However, she said she later sensed that their motive was "to stop me from filing a case" against Alarcon and that they were forcing her to take medicines "so it will appear that I am insane."

Tolentino, the woman alleged, "saw to it that whenever she (was) not around at least somebody (would) look after me and I was not allowed to go out of the room without her or any companion."

Although Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo was not included in the complaint, the woman alleged that he tried to stop her from filing the rape complaint against Alarcon.

"He (asked) me to give them time to resolve the incident within the confines of the church and not to file the case," she said in her affidavit.

Last Feb. 20, she said Tolentino allowed her to go out with her cousin, but reminded her of a 6 p.m. curfew "or something (might) happen to me."

But instead of returning to the convent, she said she went to a house in the Jaro district and met with her lawyer the next day.

The woman alleged that Alarcon, with whom she supposedly had had an intimate relationship, raped her on two occasions after she decided to end their amorous affair.

The Jaro archdiocese earlier said a tribunal was looking into the woman’s allegations.