NOT only is Presidential Decree #1727 erroneously named as the Bomb Joke Law, it does not punish a mere prank or joke about bombs. The Marcos decree requires not just false information about a bomb, it must relate to a threat to kill or injure a person or to destroy property with a bomb or similar explosives.
Apparently PD #1727 has been used in arresting those who merely make a joke even if it's clearly identified as a joke when it's made. The law was used to support recent separate arrests of a man and a woman shopping in Cebu City malls.
Aware of the law's defect, Agusan del Norte Rep. Erlpe John Amante filed in previous Congress House Bill 3294. Titled "Anti-Threat Jokes Act of 2014," it includes pranks as it punishes dissemination by word of mouth or any other means the "false presence or threat of bombs."
Conviction under PD #1727, Amante said in 2014, is elusive. Besides, under the decree, military tribunals have exclusive jurisdiction. Thus, his proposal.
Did Amante's bill become a law? Most probably not, otherwise it would've been used by police in arresting recent pranksters. And House Bill 421, or House Bomb Threat Prohibition Act of 2016, filed by Deputy Speaker Miro Quimbo, wouldn't be amending the same old PD.
Quimbo wants to raise the fine of P400,000 (within P1 million to P5 million) and the jail term from the present five years max. Surely, that penalty would be too excessive on someone whose prank or joke didn't inflict any damage.
Clarify offense
The House may adopt a graduated scale of penalties, depending on extent of death or property toll. More acutely needed is that the new law must make it clear that it punishes even a prank or a joke, even if no harm is intended or results.
The title of a law doesn't necessarily make an act punishable just as announcing that you're about to tell a joke doesn't assure its funny.
(paseares@gmail.com)