BAGUIO CITY – The leadership of the Baguio City Police Office (BCPO) reported that rape cases in the city for the first ten months of the year significantly decreased contrary to earlier reports indicating a surge in rape cases in the city.
BCPO City Director Police Col. Allen Rae F. Co said that from January to October this year, the different police stations were able to record some 40 rape cases compared to the registered 44 rape cases during the same period last year.
The police official claimed that most of the reported rape cases are incest rape and are usually committed in the residences of both the victims and the suspects.
“We hope that there will be no more additional rape cases for this year. We also hope that there will be no more family relations that will be strained because of the reported rape cases,” Col. Co stressed.
He pointed out that appropriate assistance is being extended to the rape victims considering the sensitivity of the cases aside from the fact that counselling and other pertinent interventions are being provided to them by the City Social Welfare and Development Office to allow them to recover from their bizarre experience and for them to move on in hurdling the challenges of life.
According to him, another factor that was discovered by investigators on the occurrence of rape is the intoxication of both the suspect and the victim where the former take advantage of the situation to pursue his lust, thus, the need for females to be vigilant on their actions so that they will not be taken advantage even by their relatives or family members.
He recommended that there should be a continuing information and education campaign among the concerned government agencies, the police and barangay officials because rape cases usually occur inside the residences of individuals when both the female and male are left wherein the latter tend to take advantage of the situation which should not be the case.
Co asserted that the females are not being blamed for the occurrence of rape cases but what is important is for them to be vigilant about the prevailing situations in their surroundings because the police will not always be around to extend the needed assistance to them when in times of crisis.
He urged concerned sectors to help the local police force in the implementation of an intensified campaign for females to be able to avoid being abused not only by their own relatives and family members but also their friends and acquaintances.
The local police force has sufficient number of assigned female law enforcers who conduct the required investigation of reported cases so that rape victims will have the confidence to divulge the circumstances of the incidents that transpired to boost the filing of the appropriate cases against the perpetrators of the crimes.
The Philippine National Police (PNP) established the Women’s and Children’s Protection Desk that will solely cater to complaints on women and child abuses considering the increasing number of such cases that tend to affect the relationships of relatives and family members considering that most of the suspects to such sensitive cases are known to the victims.
By Dexter A. See
