EDITORIAL - Life term for hazing

Perhaps this case will help discourage violent initiation rites. Three former cadets of the Philippine Military Academy were convicted yesterday by the Baguio City Regional Trial Court in connection with the fatal hazing of PMA plebe Darwin Dormitorio in 2019. The three were sentenced to life in prison.

The 20-year-old Dormitorio died on Sept. 18, 2019, just two months after he entered the military academy. He died a day after being found unconscious and rushed to the PMA Hospital. Before his death, Dormitorio had told police probers that he was beaten and forced to perform physically abusive exercises by cadets Shalimar Imperial, Felix Lumbag Jr. and Julius Tadena. Imperial and Lumbag reportedly electrocuted Dormitorio’s genitals with a taser as punishment for losing the boots of an upperclassman, Axl Rey Sanupao, who was included in the indictment for murder, hazing and torture but later cleared.

Probers learned that Dormitorio and other plebes had been subjected by upperclassmen for about a month to various forms of physical abuse including electrocution using tasers. Tadena, who was convicted of fatal hazing, was ordered by Baguio RTC Judge Ligaya Itliong Rivera to indemnify Dormitorio’s family P2 million. All three convicted former cadets were also ordered to pay the family damages and attorney’s fees.

Too bad Dormitorio’s father, retired Army Col. William Dormitorio, died before the verdict was handed down. The elder Dormitorio, a member of the PMA’s Marangal Class of 1974, had called for reforms in the military academy, which has gained notoriety for violent initiation rites.

Two laws have been passed against hazing and other violent, inhuman and degrading initiation rites in academic institutions, fraternities, sororities and similar organizations. The laws make even school authorities and fraternity or sorority advisers accountable when hazing occurs, especially when it leads to death. Yet the violence has continued in recent years, with advisers and school authorities cleared of culpability.

In the death of Dormitorio, the Baguio prosecutor’s office dropped the charges of hazing, torture and dereliction of duty against Lt. Gen. Ronnie Evangelista and Brig. Gen. Bartolome Bacarro, who were the PMA chief and commandant of cadets, respectively, when Dormitorio died. Still, the court ruling yesterday brought relief to Dormitorio’s relatives, who said they were not done in their pursuit of justice. The ruling should also serve as a deterrent to more violence in the name of twisted brotherhood.