THE killers clearly wanted the killing of an alleged notorious thief and drug pusher known not only in the neighborhood of San Isidro, Talisay City but also in the rest of Cebu and the country.
They hanged the bullet-riddled body of one Renante Otero from Mananga Bridge, using a rope around his neck, its face covered with a strip of cloth, hands and feet tied, the pants pulled to his leg, and with a sign tucked, which read “Ay(aw) kog sunda. Tulisan ko.” (Don’t follow my example. I am a thief.)
The execution of a crime suspect couldn’t have been more widely advertised and its message effectively sent.
Theater, hype
Heavy traffic flows on the bridge, a major artery to many south Cebu towns and the cities of Naga, Carcar and Toledo. Many people live under the bridge and the banks of its dried-up river, some of whom heard gunshots at dawn, and were the first to find the dangling body in the morning, on Monday (July 22). Discovery of the body was quick and spreading the news was fast and wide.
The setting provided more theater and hype, a lot more than what dumping of a body in the bushes or into some ravine, or leaving it in a car, would’ve given media and internet users.
Cebu has not seen in years that kind of publicity of an extrajudicial killing, which uses the bridge, complete with a compelling note for public consumption.
Suicides, placards
Suicides. yes, particularly at the Mactan-Mandaue bridge, where a rash of attempted suicides at one time prodded the Provincial Board to consider the idea of putting up a steel barrier against anyone climbing up the span.
Placards, yes, supposedly to justify the execution and warn other criminals not to follow the executed person’s example.
Location and props produced the image of body twisting in the wind, which would attract curiosity seekers and internet prowlers. They even left some spent shells on the bridge, indicating a public execution, not just the flagrant display after the deed.
They did the same thing in medieval England, when kings lined the side of bridges with severed heads of traitors on pike, or in modern Mexico, where police and drug cartels compete on which presentation of cadavers along bridges would strike more fear in their enemy.
To strike fear
The intent is plainly to strike fear: they can get you and they get away with it.
The advertising aside, people wondered who did it? Who or which group had the motive, capacity and gall? Talisay City Mayor Samsam Gullas reportedly asked the police to find and prosecute the culprits, which is how peace and order and rule of law in a community are normally upheld.
But Otero had been “in and out of prisons,” “a notorious thief and drug pusher.” What chance is there for his case to be solved in these times?
In Cebu alone during the past months, killings of a prosecutor, lawyers, a mayor and a former mayor, police and PDEA agents--among many other “more worthy” citizens--have become cold cases. And it looks like not many people give a damn.