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Filipino writer Alex Pinpin together with four pesants,-Aristedes Sarmiento, Riel Custodio, Michael Masayes and Enrico Ybanez,were arrested by armed security personnel of the Arroyo regime last April 28, 2006, on their way to a May Day Labor rally in Manila. They were later known as the “Tagaytay Five” After two years, last July 4, the Tagaytay City Regional Court Branch 18 started hearing their petition for bail. After a stalled investigation since June 2006, the State Commission on Human Rights (CHR) finally ruled that the state violated the activists’ rights when they were abducted and jailed.
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Press Release
Philippine Peasant Support Network (Pesante)-USA
July 13, 2006
Free The Tagaytay Five. Now-Pesante-USA
Los Angeles-- Filipino writer Alex Pinpin together with four pesants,-Aristedes Sarmiento, Riel Custodio, Michael Masayes and Enrico Ybanez,were arrested by armed security personnel of the Arroyo regime last April 28, 2006, on their way to a May Day Labor rally in Manila. They were later known as the “Tagaytay Five”
After two years, last July 4, the Tagaytay City Regional Court Branch 18 started hearing their petition for bail. After a stalled investigation since June 2006, the State Commission on Human Rights (CHR) finally ruled that the state violated the activists’ rights when they were abducted and jailed.
The CHR charged that the police violated the code of conduct of law-enforcement officials. It concluded that the police officers were guilty of human rights violations (abduction, unlawful arrest, arbitrary detention) and recommended their case to the government Ombudsman. The Tagaytay 5 earlier filed a case against the military for robbery, torture, and “incriminatory machinations.”
In her visit at the Cavite police regional headquarters, even the new Commission Chair Leila de Lima noted that the 20-square-meter custodial jail where the farmers have been locked up for two years did not pass the United Nations’ minimum standard for the treatment of prisoners (report by Jocelyn Uy, Daily Inquirer, 7 July 2008).
On the day of the hearing, however, the state prosecutors requested a postponement, claiming that they need time to prepare their witnesses. Pinpin and his companions responded that this delaying tactic would allow the police to “scrounge for more witnesses and manufacture credible evidences so as to win a conviction, which they failed to achieve after two years and two months of preparation for this legal offensive
Thus, the Philippine Peasant Support Network(Pesante)-USA calls for the release of the Tagaytay Five” We believe that justice delayed is justice denied. Release them at once and drop all the charges against them.
FREE THE TAGAYTAY FIVE NOW!
Original: FREE THE TAGAYTAY FIVE