Thursday, August 23, 2007 Home remains no. 1 deterrent to juvenile crimes
BACOLOD City Police Office chief Ronilo Quebrar on Wednesday said juvenile delinquency is a symptom of family breakdown rather than matters of police arrest.
He also stressed that the home remains to be a number one deterrent to juvenile crimes if parents, regardless, of status in life, will only take time teaching their children of good values and right manners and good conduct.
Quebrar made a recent report on juvenile rape case as a starting point in discussing such social problem which involved three young boys who reportedly gang-raped a young girl in the heart of the city.
He also discussed the characters of “rugby boys” who may differ from the rape suspects but still belong to this category, which involves boys and girls at a tender age of 12 up or below.
Quebrar stressed that juvenile delinquency is not a matter of police crime statistics but a question of planned parenthood.
"Poverty, by the way, is not an excuse for a deliberate failure of planned parenthood," he said.
"Why? Because generally you catch them in the streets, and soon they're back. Catch them again, and they're back and so on. What more can we do when the police force is but a handful," Quebrar said.
"Obviously, there are those who evade arrest and those may be what you see in the streets," he said.
"Now you have this juvenile crime which is more complicated because it is sexual in nature. In as much as we would like to correct the situation our mandate is limited to apprehensions. Immediately, we endorse them to the Department of Social Services and Development (DSSD)," Quebrar added.
Quebrar explained that the 'cyclical' nature of young criminals and most importantly, their rehabilitation is already the counseling mechanism of DSSD.
Meanwhile, DSSD officer-in-charge (OIC) Sally Abelarde is confident that their one social worker and 15 barangay-based counselors have sufficient training in dealing with juvenile delinquents.
Abelarde however explained that, "The families of these young criminals is a factor that is extremely difficult to 'control.' In fact, DSSD has no control whatsoever of how families will deal with those whom they had endorsed."
"As counselee-clients, the DSSD social workers cannot make daily visit to the homes of these delinquents. Unless their homes operate as 'functional' homes, then juvenile crimes can be minimized," Abelarde said. (GABS)
