Squeal on the mastermind

Batas Mauricio .

THERE was a very interesting and greatly important point that veteran broadcaster Ludovico “Vic” Somintac raised. His point: “If the people who are being implicated to in the killing of Ako Bicol Party List Rep. Rodel Batocabe were the very ones who gave the information that pointed to the person who masterminded the crime, would they be the ones who will receive the P50-million reward money that had been put up in the case?”

From where I sit, I can say that there is no prohibition against the implicated suspects in the murder of Batocabe receiving the P50-million reward money, if it is true that the information which pinned down who really ordered the killing came from them. There is no law that prohibits this kind of a situation in the Philippines, no matter how awkward this may appear to be to some people.

Fact is, this is what the masterminds in the killing of others or in the commission of equally heinous crimes should really fear or be wary about: when the reward money to pin down the authors of a crime is raised to a level that is hard to resist on the part of those who were ordered to carry out that crime, it would just be a matter of time before information leading to the arrest of those masterminds or authors are given to the authorities.

Indeed, this was what happened in the Batocabe double slay case. According to reports, the “contract price” for the brutal gun slaying of the lawmaker was pegged by the alleged mastermind to only P5 million. On the other hand, the reward money for any information leading to the arrest of the mastermind in the killing was placed at P50 million, with President Duterte contributing about P30 million of it.

Given this kind of a situation, the temptation to turn against the person or persons who ordered the hit on Batocabe became simply too great to overcome. The actual killers of the poor fellow themselves came out in the open and gave the necessary information that named the mastermind. Indeed, the reward money was just too considerable an amount to be ignored, when compared to the fee for the killing that was paid earlier.

I think that this was the same objective of lawyer Justin Batocabe, the son of Rep. Batocabe, in his two pronouncements on the killing of his father. He said in his Dec. 26, 2018 pronouncement: “For the sake of the coming Christmas season, we are ready to forgive and extend the hand of peace to the least guilty so that the mastermind in the killing of my father can now be identified. We are hoping that justice would now be served to our town, Daraga…”

On Dec. 27, 2018, this was what Justin said, in part: “We reiterate that Witness Protection as well as the (P)50M reward fund will be made available to whoever gives us valuable information in our search for justice for both our Father and SPO2 Orlando Diaz. Kaya sa mga nasasangkot, sana magkakunsensya na po kayo. Maaaring ito na ang huling pagkakaton niyo na maituro ang mastermind…”

Justin was, of course, right. If the authorities have already succeeded in gathering enough evidence pertaining to his father’s killing, especially on who masterminded it, it was only but proper for those who were ordered to carry out the lawmaker’s actual execution to already come out in the open and disclose who the mastermind was, to make them eligible for the P50-million reward money.