ONLY female officers should have direct and immediate custody of children brought to police stations for any reason.
Kids visiting family members in police detention must also be aided by station’s women and children protection desk, says solon
A member of Congress wants to double the number of female officers in the Philippine National Police (PNP).
Surigao del Sur Rep. Johnny Pimentel wants to reserve for women at least 20 percent of the PNP’s annual recruitment, training and education quota, up from the legal minimum of 10 percent.
“We are also pushing for immediate administrative reforms in the PNP so that only female officers should have direct and immediate custody of children brought to police stations for any reason, regardless whether they are considered in conflict with the law or not,” Pimentel said.
“In other jurisdictions with strong child protection systems, whenever a young girl is taken in for any reason, male officers cannot just put her in a police car. They have to call for a female officer to accompany the child,” Pimentel said.
“There’s no reason why the PNP cannot do this now. We already have ‘Women and Children Protection Desks’ headed by female officers in all police stations,” Pimentel said.
Pimentel’s call for reforms in the custodial handling of minors came after a Manila policeman was accused of forcing a 15-year-old girl to have sex with him in exchange of the freedom of her parents who had been arrested for alleged drug offenses.
Though there was no case against them, the daughter and her aunt were also brought to the Sampaloc police station when the parents were nabbed.
It was at the station that PO1 Eduardo Valencia threatened the girl and told her to have sex with him so that the case against her parents would be dropped.
In a viral video clip, Valencia claimed that what happened between him and the girl was nothing new, and that officers like him were accustomed to having their way with suspected drug offenders and their family members.
Valencia made the remarks as he tried to wiggle out of trouble while he was being berated by Director Guillermo Eleazar, the chief of the National Capital Regional Police Office.
The girl’s mother had reported the rape to the police, alleging that Valencia brought her daughter to a motel in Manila on Oct. 26.
Valencia is facing a statutory rape charge and dismissal from service.
To prevent abuse, Pimentel also wants children and even women visiting family members in police detention to be accompanied by a female officer at all times. - FROM THE OFFICE OF REP. JOHHNY T. PIMENTEL (2ND DISTRICT, SURIGAO DEL SUR)