The Philippine National Police (PNP) suspended Friday the crackdown on convicts released due to good conduct because of a conflicting list reportedly provided by the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) to the Department of Justice (DoJ).
General Oscar Albayalde, PNP Chief, ordered all 17 Police Regional Offices across the country to stop the hunt for the remaining convicts erroneously released through the Good Conduct Time Allowance (GCTA) law, according to Police Lieutenant Colonel Kim Molitas, police deputy spokesperson.
“Pending the clean list yet to be received from the Department of Justice, the command group of the Philippine National Police has ordered the suspension of the arrest of all the PDLs [persons deprived of liberty] released through the GCTA program,” Molitas said in a press conference at Camp Crame in Quezon City.
Earlier, Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra revealed that the list submitted by BuCor contained names of inmates who were freed due to parole and executive clemency, not GCTA. He then ordered the temporary suspension of the nationwide crackdown.
Molitas admitted that the PNP used an old list in going after the convicts, not the new list from the DoJ.
“We had the previous list. We are waiting for the list to come from the DoJ before we make any arrest,” she said.
Meanwhile, Molitas noted that the monitoring of all PDLs will still continue despite the suspension of the warrantless arrests.
“We have advised our police officers on the ground to continue processing them if ever meron mag-surrender pa sa kanilang istasyon. These are PDLs who, if they so decide to voluntarily surrender, will still be accepted and processed by our plice officers and eventually be turned over sa ating BuCOr,” she said.
In Metro Manila, at least four PDLs were arrested as early as 7 a.m. when Police Major General Guillermo Eleazar, chief of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO), led the deployment of metro tracker teams as early as Friday midnight.
The four PDLs were identified by Eleazar as Ernesto Zaldivar, 64; Rolando Cano, 46; Jose Lozada, 72; and Cezar Pingco, 40.
Cano and Lozada were recaptured in Tondo, Manila, while Zano and Pingco were re-arrested in Makati and Muntinlupa cities, respectively. All four of them were convicted of rape.
The operations of Metro Manila cops were suspended by Eleazar around 8 a.m. when he learned about the Justice Department’s order.
“Tigil muna ang pag-arrest, monitoring ulit,” he said.
Molitas said the NCRPO was the lone police regional office in the country which recaptured PDLs who benefitted from the GCTA law.
As of 11 p.m. Thursday, a total of 1,717 out of the 1,914 heinous crime convicts voluntarily surrendered to police and BuCor, as per DoJ data.
This means that at least 197 inmates remain at-large despite President Duterte’s 15-day ultimatum for them to surrender starting September 4. The grace period lapsed on Thursday, September 19. (Martin Sadongdong)
