It’s Holy Week and the killings continue

It is now the start of Holy Week and for the first time in my 19 years on this show, Straight from the Sky, I was able to convince my dear friend, Fr. Ernesto Javier, SJ, to be on our show to talk about the importance of Holy Week to Catholics. What I didn’t know about Fr. Javier was that he studied in Berchman’s College in Lahug, Cebu, where the University of the Philippines Cebu now stands. He also obtained a licentiate in Sacred Theology, cum laude, at Boston College, a master's degree in Educational Management at Harvard, and a doctor of philosophy degree from the University of Michigan.

Fr. Javier was president of Xavier University and served as director of the Sacred Heart School in Cebu from 1991 to 2009. He was a member of the board of directors of among others, the Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges, and Universities, Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines, and the Mindanao-Sulu Coordinating Council of Catholic Schools. He joined the Society of Jesus in 1950 and was ordained in 1964. So please watch our Holy Week presentation with Fr. Ernesto Javier on SkyCable’s channel 53 at 8 p.m. with replays on Wednesday and Saturday same time and channel. We also have replays on MyTV’s channel 30 at 9 p.m. Monday and at 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. on Wednesday and Friday.

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It’s been more than a month since we learned of the horrific killing of 16-year-old Christine Lee Silawan in Lapu-Lapu City. The latest report we gathered on this was the confession of Renato “Renren” Llenes, 43, that he killed the teenager and that the girl’s ex-boyfriend has nothing to do with the killing. This is something of an enigma for many of our readers since the ex-boyfriend was arrested by the National Bureau of Investigation who later told the media that traces of blood was found on his hat and shirt. I guess this is the reason why Christine’s mother still wants the 17-year-old boy included in the case.

But Police Regional Office-7 Director Debold Sinas said that the police can’t charge the boy as they do not have evidence against him. This only tells us that the NBI and the police are not sharing information for the sake of justice for Christine! I dare say that the police and the NBI should sit down and resolve whatever issues they have for the sake of justice. Why did the boy’s clothes have the bloodstains of Silawan?

This was the subject of an editorial by The FREEMAN last Friday entitled “NBI, police should unite in solving Silawan case.” Just because Llenes already confessed, it just makes me wonder why he cleared the ex-boyfriend of this crime. This is something that both the police and NBI have to solve. The NBI and the police should know that for as long that they cannot clear up this issue then we cannot consider the murder case of Christine Silawan solved!

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Another killing in supposedly peaceful Cebu City was a shooting that happened last Thursday in a coffee shop along F. Ramos Street. Those killed were an award-winning homegrown barista, Mr. John Michael Hermoso, 29, and Kis Tryvl Ramos, 21, who was supposed to graduate with a degree in Psychology from UP Cebu. Two other employees, Sherwin Dean Rivera and Jerome Amada, were wounded.

Police investigators said that the two assailants apparently waited outside The Good Cup Coffee Company and launched the attack when the shop was about to close for the night. Hermoso is the shop’s co-owner and co-manager. The police are looking at personal grudge as an initial motive since the morning prior to the shooting Hermoso was reportedly seen in a heated argument with someone.

We can only hope that the police investigators can retrieve closed-circuit television camera footage to possibly help identify the assailants who were wearing full-faced helmets when they carried out the attack. We learned that

Hermoso won in the Philippine Brewer’s Cup last month and had already packed his bags for Boston, Massachusetts, where he was set to compete in the 2019 World Coffee Championships on April 11 to 14, something that very few people know about.