DETAINED. Major General Jovito Palparan ran a senatorial campaign in 2016 from his detention cell at Fort Bonifacio. Photo by Carlo Gabuco/Rappler

BULACAN, Philippines (UPDATED) – Retired Army Major General Jovito Palparan was found guilty on Monday, September 17, of kidnapping and serious illegal detention in the 2006 disappearance of University of the Philippines (UP) students Karen Empeno and Sherlyn Cadapan.

Palparan’s co-accused Lieutenant Colonel Felipe Anotado and S/Sgt Edgardo Osorio were also found guilty of kidnapping and serious illegal detention. The decision was promulgated by the Malolos Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 15.

The 3 are sentenced to up to 40 years in prison, and are each ordered to pay P100,000 in civil indemnity and P200,000 for moral damages.

Judge Alexander Tamayo committed Palparan, Anotado, and Osorio to be detained at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) but their lawyers appealed in open court to let them remain at the custodial center at the Fort Bonifacio in Taguig due to another pending case at the Malolos RTC.

Senior Assistant State Prosecutor Juan Pedro Navera said Supreme Court rules state that Palparan et al would be detained in Bilibid upon conviction.

As the sentence was being read, Palparan shouted to Judge Tamayo: “Duwag ka Judge! Napakaduwag mo!” (You're a coward, Judge! You are such a coward!)

He was warned of contempt but Palparan retorted: “Kahit i-contempt mo kami! Makukulong naman kami eh!” (Even if you cite us for contempt, [it doesn't matter]. We will be jailed anyway!)

Palparan did not stop and told both Judge Tamayo and Navera: “Napaka gago mo! (You're such a fool!)”

Correct decision

Erlinda Cadapan, mother of Sherlyn, wept after the decision was read. She said on the way out of the court: "Tama naman po ang pasya dahil sa ebidensyang ibinigay namin sa korte. Tama po ang pasya ng korteng ito." (The court's decision is correct because of the evidence we presented to them. The decision of this court is correct.)

Asked if she remains hopeful her daughter is alive, Erlinda said, “Habang buhay ako, may iaasa akong buhay ang aking anak, at dapat ibalik ng tarantado na ‘yun! Hindi naman nahiyang sumigaw sa loob ng korte, sigawan si Judge, hindi naman nahiyang gumawa ng ganoon."

(As long as I am alive, I will have hopes that my daughter is alive, and she must be returned by that stupid fool! He had no shame shouting inside the courtroom, shouting at the judge, he was not ashamed to do that.)

Cadapan and Karen Empeño went missing on June 26, 2006 in Hagonoy, Bulacan.

The Malolos RTC ordered Palparan's arrest in December 2011, after which he went into hiding. He was found after more than 3 years, in August 2014, in an apartment above a bakery in Sta. Mesa.

He has been detained at the custodial center at Fort Bonifacio in Taguig ever since.

A co-accused, Sergeant Rizal Hilario, remains at large.

Palparan was a decorated general for his implementation of Gloria Arroyo’s counter-insurgency campaign. He gained notoriety from his assignments in Mindoro, Samar, and Central Luzon, and which earned him the monicker Berdugo or The Butcher from human rights activists.

Palparan ran and lost as senator in the 2016 national elections.

Witnesses



One of the prosecution's biggest witnesses is farmer Raymond Manalo, who claims to have seen both Cadapan and Empeño at a military cell, where he was also allegedly kept by military captors.

In detention, Manalo said he had seen and talked to Palparan twice.

Manalo said he was abducted on February 14, 2006, on suspicions that he was also a communist rebel, but was able to escape a year later on August 12, 2007.

Manalo testified in court that he saw military men torture and sexually molest Cadapan, 29 at the time, and Empeño, 22 then.

Another witness is Wilfredo Ramos Jr, who was only 14 years old at the time of abduction. Cadapan and Empeño were living with them for their immersion work, when armed men allegedly barged into their home and took the two women.

Ramos testified the same to the Court of Appeals, which affirmed Palparan’s arrest in 2017.

It was Ramos who identified Osorio, an aide of Palparan, as being among the armed men who forcibly took Cadapan and Empeño in Hagonoy.

Palparan has denied all accusations, and has earnestly fought the charges through motions all dismissed by the court since.

– Rappler.com</s>A Philippine regional court sentenced retired army general Jovito Palparan, nicknamed 'The Butcher,' to life imprisonment on Monday for kidnapping, illegal detention and disappearance of two student activists from the University of the Philippines who remain missing since 2006.

Colonel Felipe Anotad and Sergeant Edgardo Osorio were also given a life-term by the Bulacan regional court in north Manila where Karen Empeno and Sherlyn Cadapan, students of University of the Philippines, went missing 12 years ago.</s>A retired army general accused of being behind the killing of dozens of leftist activists in the Philippines has been sentenced to life for kidnapping two university students in 2006.

Jovito Palparan, nicknamed "The Butcher" for his deadly campaign against communist rebels, was found guilty of the disappearance of two university students Karen Empeno and Sherlyn Cadapan.

Judge Alexander Tamayo also convicted two of Palparan's co-accused, an army lieutenant and a sergeant, and ordered the three to pay 300,000 Philippine peso ($5,500) each in damages to the family of the two students.

Palparan protested the conviction, shouting at the judge: "You're a coward, judge! You're such a coward!"

Tamayo warned Palparan that he would be cited for contempt, but the former general shouted: "It doesn't matter. We will be jailed anyway. You're such a fool."

Empeno and Cadapan were kidnapped from a rented home in the town of Hagonoy in Bulacan province, 36 kilometres north of Manila, in June 2006 by people believed to be soldiers.

Empeno, who was then 22, was doing research on the plight of farmers in the province, while Cadapan, then 29, was a community organiser for a leftist farmers group in Bulacan.

The two were believed to have been raped, tortured and later killed by soldiers, but their bodies have not been found.

When charges were filed by the parents, Palparan went into hiding and was only found three years later in Manila.

Local and international human rights groups welcomed Palparan's conviction, which came seven years after the case was filed against him in 2011.

The National Union of People's Lawyers (NUPL), which counseled Cadapan and Empeno's families, welcomed the ruling, saying that "human rights violations will meet their match".

"[Palparan's] conviction sends the message that perpetrators of hideous human rights violations will meet their match in the fortitude of the mothers, the strength of the mass movement, the courage of human rights defenders, and the value of good lawyering for the people," the NUPL said in a statement.</s>A Philippine court on Monday convicted retired army Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan and two others for the highly publicized enforced disappearance of two female student activists from the University of the Philippines. The court sentenced Palparan, Lt. Col. Felipe Anotado, and Staff Sgt. Edgardo Osorio to life imprisonment for the kidnapping and illegal detention of Karen Empeño and Sherlyn Cadapan in 2006, who remain missing.

The verdict is an important step for justice in the Philippines, where serious abuses by the military and police are rarely punished. Palparan is possibly the highest ranking military officer convicted in a human rights case. The extrajudicial killings of political activists became commonplace during the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship, which ended in the 1986 “people power” revolution, and continue to this day.

For years, Palparan, 68, was a celebrated figure in the Philippine in the Philippine military’s campaign against the communist New People’s Army. He was known as “The Butcher” because of the bloodshed that ensued wherever he was assigned. Prosecutors originally charged Palparan in 2011 for the abduction of Cadapan and Empeño, but he evaded authorities for years and was arrested only in 2014.

In 2015, a witness, Raymond Manalo, testified that he saw Palparan along with Cadapan and Empeño inside a military camp in Bulacan province where he, too, had been detained for being a suspected communist rebel. Manalo alleged that the two women had been severely tortured and raped while in Palparan’s custody. Another witness, Wilfredo Ramos Jr., also testified in court that he had seen the abduction of the two women by Sergeant Osorio and other armed men. In its decision, the court said Ramos's testimony "dovetailed" with that of Manalo’s, constituting “persuasive and unassailable proof that the three accused in complicity with each other committed the crimes imputed against them.”

The guilty verdicts and long sentences came after a long and agonizing struggle for justice by the families and supporters of the two activists. It rekindles hope among the families of many other victims of human rights violations in the Philippines. And it serves as a reminder to state security forces that justice and the law will catch up with them sooner or later.</s>Karen starts off the show with returning guest Vic Cohen to discuss calorie counting and healthy food choices. Then, criminal defense attorney and legal analyst Joe “The Shark” Lopez joins Karen to talk about Paul Manafort’s guilty plea.

As always, Karen provides updates on the latest legal news and answers legal questions from listeners.

You can find Karen Conti on Facebook. The Karen Conti Show airs Sundays from 7pm-9pm.
Former Philippine Army general and politician Jovito Palparan is convicted for the kidnapping and disappearance of students Sherlyn Cadapan and Karen Empeño. He and two other associates are sentenced to life imprisonment.