The Headline for the local community paper reads.. “Rob Suspect Gunned Down”. This attack occurred just minutes after he posted bail, set free and in the company of family members and on board a taxi, headed to the pier to catch a boat that would take him back to his hometown.
The gunmen, a duo on a motorcycle with identities concealed by crash helmets, pursued the taxi through busy traffic and despite the taxi driver’s effort to elude the assassins, especially upon the panic-stricken egging of the passengers who knew they were being trailed; successfully accomplished their mission and pumped two pieces of lead into the head of the recently released rob suspect.
Everybody else in the cab scampered away to safety with none other than the shooting victim’s father stuck in the front passenger seat of the cab who could not get out because the door was jammed; after the volley of shots he looks over his left shoulder to see the lifeless body of his son, in the back seat. What great pain it could probably be for a parent to see his child die… and at the hands of men; recollecting that just a few seconds ago he was still alive. What even greater pain to be stuck and helpless at the front seat while someone with a gun stole your son’s life. Yet the greatest pain of all to come; “there will be no justice for his son.”
The rob suspect is merely a statistic, another head count in Cebu City’s already ballooned list of vigilante style killings, often with same modus operandi. A recently released felon, often accompanied by family is felled by assassins bullets usually while in a cab; while the perpetrators go free, and await instructions for the next target. In fact a similar killing occurred not too long ago… same set up, same modus. The victim hardly makes it to the boat.
Today we can’t help but read about the upsurge of crime in the city, robberies taking place, cell phones being taken and sometimes the owner being shot for resisting.. and over a cellular phone! We hear of heists gone bad and the innocent dying.
We can’t help but ask ourselves, if this is still the same city we grew in… safe; isolated from the violence we often see on TV in the North and in the South. We were once safe, today I am not so sure. Upon reading news stories of crimes in the city we can’t help but remark, “I wish all these criminals were dead or taken care of expeditiously”, and maybe the silent wish of a hushed community is now being granted by unknown untouchable powers… one criminal at a time.
There are those who believe that the fire of criminality should be doused with an equally commensurate force, or even more to really put it out. Why fight the gun with the courts; go bring a gun to face a gun wielder. When you come to a gunfight you do not attend prepared for only a fistfight but with a firearm as well. There are those who believe in this hard stance against crime, and taking the fight to the criminals, some can even cite another city in the Philippines, that has benefited from vigilantism.
The masked vigilantes that execute these missions are well trained, expert marksmen, seamless in execution and above all, hardly ever found. It makes the community jittery yet quiet.
Some speculate that there might be people in position who believe that vigilantism could be an effective method of curbing criminality in the city, but what about the social and moral implications? Do they take a back seat, in order to achieve an end? What about rights, doesn’t a democracy ensure that we have the same rights, regardless of social stature; applied fairly and equally to felon, the felled, and the law abiding.
As I made my way home today, there were random checkpoints along the way; policemen flagging down and stopping motorcycle riders for identification; and this was midmorning. As always, a reactionary response… though a slight crime deterrent, does not really stop criminality altogether.
Criminals, will just become more careful, more cunning, and even more daring… emboldened by successes and by the failure of the law to find them. Vigilantes are themselves criminals, and the vigilante culture initiated by a few can cause copy cat crimes and acts of violence… punctuated with “blame it on the vigilantes”.
Criminals will not stop their activities, they will simply innovate.
Policemen stopping motorcycles at a checkpoint? Solution simple, acquire a car.. that way you never get stopped. Execute the crime, ditch the car at an identified area, where another ride awaits. I didn’t event need to be a criminal to figure that out, I guess I have been watching too many movies.
I am reminded by the security checks at the mall when you enter the car park, guards stop you to check your trunk; a deterrent indeed but no numb skull of a crook in the middle of executing a plan with a goal to cause havoc, will simply put something in the trunk just so it can easily be discovered by mall security guards.
Again, none of the perpetrators of these assassinations/executions have ever been arrested nor brought to court; we in the community disdain violence and vigilantism, however we are quiet about it… are we silently hoping that some good comes out of it? Will there really?
Are we secretly hoping that it will make our community safe.. Will it really?
Do we secretly believe that it will stop crime?
There are many implications indeed and issues that arise from these vigilante killings, but I hope this shall not become a precedent for other worse things…
and I hope that we ourselves, our family or friends won’t ever be victims of vigilantes; by mistaken identity or faulty information, or by simply being an innocent bystander at the wrong place and at the wrong time. When you are in the kill zone, you are done for.
Welcome to Cebu City, welcome to the Kill Zone!
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