of the Philippines the criminal justice system is - Article 2

After 7pm the two soldiers came back and again asked Gatus
if they could speak to Ramos, but Ramos refused to meet them.
They decided to leave and told Gatus that they would return the
next day.
After 9pm Ramos was together with several of his fellow workers
in the hut when an unidentified man approached the hut and
shot him twice from about 12 metres away. Ramos’s elder brother
Romy, and their brother-in-law, Benny Pineda, found Ramos lying
on the ground and bleeding.
At around 10:15pm, residents who live near the local military
detachment heard and saw a helicopter circling over the barrio.
They also reported seeing a van leaving the detachment after
Ramos’s killing. When the news broke out, the outraged villagers
went to protest outside the military detachment around 11pm,
believing army personnel to be responsible for the death.
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VICTIMS:
1. Ernesto Bang
2. Joel Reyes
INCIDENT: Killing
ALLEGED PERPETRATORS:
Unidentified gunmen
DATE: 10 & 16 March 2005
AHRC UP-075-2005
Ernesto Bang & Joel Reyes: “No witnesses had come out
in the open for fear of reprisal”
On 10 and 16 March 2005, Ernesto Bang (50) and Joel Reyes
(33) were slain in separate shooting incidents in Camarines
Norte, Luzon.
Bang, an information officer of Kilusang Magbubukid ng
Pilipinas, a peasant organization, was shot dead on 10 March
2005 in his house in Purok 3, Barangay Malangcao in Basud.
One of four armed men who arrived at his house shot him after
he opened his front door to find out who was knocking.
Six days later in a nearby municipality, Reyes, a trishaw driver
and organizer for the Anakpawis party, was also shot dead by one
of his passengers. The suspects who posed as passengers boarded
his vehicle at a public market and shot him before reaching the
boundary of Barangays Callero and Nakalaya, Jose Panganiban.
Reyes died on the spot from several gunshot wounds.
Policemen from the Jose Panganiban municipal police and
the Scene of the Crime Operation Team officers were not able to
produce witnesses or sufficient material evidence.
In a letter dated May 31 to the Asian Human Rights
Commission Marcelo Ele Jr., Police Director of the Philippine
National Police Directorate for Investigation and Detective
Management (DIDM) said that “no witnesses had come out in
the open for fear of reprisal”. He added that in Bang’s case even
“relatives of the victim, when interviewed revealed that they
are no longer interested in filing the case due to the absence of
a witness who could identify the suspect”. Another dated 29 July
2005 from Chief Superintendent Charlegne Alejandrino, deputy
director for DIDM, added that the police could do nothing unless
the witnesses “come out in the open and willingly support the
prosecution of these cases”.
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article 2 • February 2007 Vol. 6, No. 1