Vindication and vengeance

The Quezon City prosecutor with whom the case of obstruction of justice filed by four members of the Quezon City Police District was assigned has seen fit to drop the case against Ted Failon and three of his household help for lack of evidence. Lack of evidence. There’s more. Prosecutor Mary Jean Cajandab-Pamittan goes further in saying that Ted Failon was well within his rights in refusing to hand over his cellphone to the police, especially in the absence of any court order. Apparently the same is true of entering the house premises, but Ted agreed to nevertheless. And they also gave their statements to the police, which by now everyone knows took hours, well into the next morning!

In other words, the QCPD was errant in its procedure, not to mention methods, in handling the initial investigation of Trina Etong’s shooting, and ignorant of the basic rules of law. No crime had been established, since the investigation was ongoing. And since there was no crime, how could there be obstruction? Plain and simple. But in those hours where the police were manhandling and literally collaring every possible person affiliated with Ted Failon, even under the uncontestable eyes of camera lenses and film, it was evident that all they wanted to do was jail everyone, or at least “rough them up” and give them a hard time. Obvious gestures of vengeance against a journalist critical of their failures and conduct.

Even the acts of cleaning the bathroom where Trina was found in a pool of blood – which the police found to be damning evidence against Ted - could not be faulted by the prosecutor. Yes, they were done to conceal, even erase, a ghastly sight which the youngest daughter should never see, and not to conceal a crime which had not been established at all. Then there is the unforgivable and reprehensible manner by which Trina’s siblings were treated and hauled away like common criminals. Away from a sibling’s deathbed. Their greatest fear coming true in that Trina died while they were unjustly separated from her. No amount of apology from the police, especially from the arrogant Police Superintendent Franklin Mabanag, could ever make amends for that.

But the ordeal of the Failons may be far from over. What happens now to those police currently suspended? Do they just ride out their suspensions and go back to work? Or should they be subjected to an administrative investigation and reprimand of a harsher kind, even dismissal from the force? For what they have shown was an obvious retaliation for Ted’s no holds barred comments on the incompetence and iniquities of the QCPD. And vengeance has no place in a police force, whose mandate is to uphold the law. Should they remain in the service, all they have to do is wait for another opportunity to strike, at their enemies.