When justice begins the pain ends

By Fr. Shay Cullen

OLONGAPO CITY, the Philippines — Since President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, commander-in-chief, ordered all minors be released from prison last July 16th in EO 633 a senior police chief has spoken out to decry the juvenile justice bill, he is claiming that it is too liberal, minors charged with crimes should be charged and jailed and not walk free. They could be terrorists he said, then what power do we have over them. He asked. Most of the police who take minors into custody have no fear of that law forbidding it. So the good general need not fear since the law is hardly being implemented and there are thousands of minors behind bars none of them terrorists and few of them criminal. The secretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) opposed the view and thanks for that.

Here is a story showing how much the minors suffer for simple mistake and they are neither criminals nor terrorists. It was a happy day when Jose, a small 14 year old boy was brought home to his family in Manila. They lived in a shack on an abandoned railway station platform. The small boy saw his mother in the distance and ran to her and hugged her. Both were crying with joy. A long nightmare had come to an end for them both. One day several years ago when visiting the prisons I found Jose behind bars with many other children. I was shocked and angry at the terrible conditions and I had to act and begin a campaign to free them and give them a new life.

The story of Jose began when he was hungry and he fell into temptation. He stole a cheap necklace not worth three dollars. But the owner, a street seller, was an unforgiving person. He had no understanding and he insisted on calling the police and having young Jose arrested and brought to the police station. Jose’s mother is a vegetable seller, his father is dead and he has three brothers and two sisters.

Jose is small for his age and underweight and has large appealing eyes. The necklace seller was shouting and cursing Jose. He was shamed and humiliated. The police brought him inside the jail and roughly pushed and shoved him, they twisted his arms behind his back to hurt him and he was bashed on the back of his head with a gun. It raised a huge lump and intense pain. The police shouted at him and began to beat him.

He could not hold back the tears as the pain pierced his head and brain. He cried held his head and slumped on the floor of a tiny cell packed with a dozen other street kids in ragged dirty T-shirts and shorts emaciated and starving. Their hunger and thirst was intense in the overpowering heat of the jail cell.

There was no food for Jose or the street kids because the police holding station does not feed the prisoners that is the responsibility of their family, if they have any. They didn’t send for Jose’s parents either although that’s the law but the law also says they kids must not be put in jail. But the police do it anyway.

I found Jose in the main prison near Bicutan staring from behind thick steel bars surrounded by adults twice and three times his age, it was a pitiful sight. He was scared, he was traumatized. In that hell hole with him were hardened criminals, killers and rapists.

Not only do we have to change this cruel unjust and dehumanizing system that sets out to punish kids for mistakes they learn daily from corrupt adults. We have to replace it with a humane and healing process that gives them a second chance, a new start. They need something they never had - dignity, education and affirmation that say they are good and have rights like everybody else.

This was a day of success. Jose was about to start on that new road to freedom as I pulled out a court order releasing him into the custody and care of the PREDA boys home. He would soon be on the way to Olongapo City and the joy of freedom and a taste of justice in the new children’s home that is being built in the countryside. He is now recovered and happily back with his family and at school, free to find his future.