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Sunday, September 11, 2005
Witness links victim's pa in rape, murder raps
By Mia E. Abellana
CEBU CITY -- A witness has pointed to a 13-year-old girl's father and uncle as the ones who stabbed her and then raped her in Sitio Kamang-kamang, Barangay Ocaña, Carcar, Cebu.
Police arrested Maximo Laputan, 40, and his older brother Concordio, 46, at 11 a.m. Saturday after a witness surfaced and told investigators what he saw.
Ronnie Tabura, Maximo and Concordio's nephew, said Maylen had just returned from the sari-sari store last Tuesday night when Maximo and Concordio stopped her.
Tabura recalled that the two had been drinking tuba (coconut wine) before they told him to tag along with them.
When they reached the cornfield, they ran into Maylen.
He said Maximo held his daughter, who then fought back. Maximo covered her mouth.
At this, Concordio allegedly stabbed her. Police reported that Concordio had a wound on his right hand.
But Maylen's mother Diomedes could not believe that her husband was involved in the death of their daughter, the fourth of five children.
She said the police must present to her laboratory findings that sperm was found in her daughter's privates.
She also said her husband was with her the whole time.
Maximo, a fisherman, loves all five of their children, she said.
Interviewed last Thursday, Maximo sobbed uncontrollably when he told Sun.Star Cebu how Maylen would help him sell the fish he caught each morning.
Maylen was reportedly sent to buy rice for the family's supper last Tuesday night.
Another relative, Celia, defended her brothers, saying Concordio was in Cebu City since Saturday and only returned to Carcar Wednesday morning.
She knew her brother was still in Cebu City last Tuesday because she was the one tasked to check on his house while he was gone.
She said Concordio drove a jeepney in Cebu City and recently became a widower.
The family would not defend Maximo and Concordio, she said, if they were indeed the ones who raped and killed Maylen.
Yet, Senior Police Officer 1 Meliton Agadier said they were inclined to believe Tabura's statements because most of the details he told them matched what they found in the crime scene.
A police informant told them that Tabura had admitted seeing the attack.
This prompted police to approach him and persuade him to talk.
Agadier said after they talked to Tabura at 10 a.m. Saturday, he and two companions went to their homes to ask them about what they learned.
Agadier said Concordio got angry and immediately pulled out a kitchen knife and tried to stab him, but missed.
Maximo then allegedly attacked him and then tried to flee but was stopped by his companions.
Although they had no warrants for the arrest of the two, Agadier said they could arrest the brothers for direct assault, using Concordio's kitchen knife as evidence.
He could not ascertain if this was the same knife used in stabbing Maylen.
Agadier also said they have not yet concluded Tabura's questioning and could not say yet who sliced off Maylen's left breast.
Tabura said, though, that it was Maximo who raped Maylen first, followed by Concordio.
Aside from direct assault, Agadier said they may file separate cases of rape with parricide and rape with homicide against the two brothers tomorrow.
Maylen was laid to rest at noon yesterday at the Ocaña Public Cemetery.
Diomedes lamented that her husband could not even attend the funeral as he was locked up in jail.
She said the police also did not allow them to enter the police station.
Agadier explained, though, that they had to keep the Laputans away from Tabura, who was being questioned inside, in case they tried to harm him.
Diomedes said the scratches on her husband's neck were due to relatives stopping him from acting up when he saw Maylen's body last Thursday morning.
The scratches on Maximo's arms were because of allergies, she said.
Meanwhile, Ocaña Barangay Captain Milo Bayawan has assigned barangay tanods to secure the Laputan family, saying the people of Carcar have begun to condemn them for defending Concordio and Maximo.
He said many residents were angry at what happened and he did not want them harmed.
He also appealed to the police to make sure they had enough evidence to point to the two, saying that if they made a mistake, it would be hard for the family, who has already lost Maylen in a gruesome death.
Bayawan told Sun.Star Cebu the family has asked him for his help, but he told them that he could not interfere with the police investigation.
He hopes, though, that another investigating unit such as the National Bureau of Investigation joins them to make sure. (Sun.Star Cebu/Sunnex)
(September 11, 2005 issue)
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