EDITORIAL - Harboring fugitives

If the government wants to improve its track record in capturing fugitives, it should enforce laws against obstruction of justice as well as harboring criminals and persons with pending arrest warrants.

Ricardo Zulueta, trusted aide of former Bureau of Corrections chief Gerald Bantag, had been wanted by authorities since being tagged as a prime participant in the 2022 murders of broadcaster Percival “Percy Lapid” Mabasa and an inmate in the New Bilibid Prison. The nation next learned of Zulueta’s whereabouts only this year when he was reported to have died of heart failure on March 15 at the Bataan Peninsula Medical Center in Dinalupihan town where he was reportedly brought by his brother.

Who helped Zulueta evade arrest for over a year? Equally important was his cause of death, with the Department of Justice indicating suspicions of foul play. Zulueta was crucial in directly linking Bantag to the murders.

Yesterday, agents of the National Bureau of Investigation raided two houses of Bantag in Laguna and Caloocan City to serve the warrant for his arrest, but failed to find the accused mastermind of Lapid’s murder. Bantag, a former official of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology, is surely getting help in evading arrest. He may also be hiding in plain sight, with certain authorities looking the other way, like retired Army general Jovito Palparan Jr.

After three years in hiding, Palparan was arrested in August 2014 in a house in crowded Sta. Mesa, Manila by a composite team of the NBI and the military’s Naval Intelligence Group. A regional trial court in Bulacan had ordered his arrest in December 2011 for kidnapping, serious illegal detention and the disappearance of students Sherlyn Cadapan and Karen Empeno.

Dubbed the “butcher” by human rights activists, Palparan was suspected to have been harbored by persons or groups who lauded his campaign against communist insurgents. He is serving a life sentence without eligibility for parole in Bilibid, but there was no attempt to go after anyone who helped him during his three years in hiding.

This failure to penalize persons who harbor fugitives guarantees that the illegal act will continue. With people seeing no accountability for obstruction of justice, authorities will face a tough time catching fugitives.