Press statement ng National Press Club

NAGPALABAS ng press statement ang National Press Club regarding sa decision ng DOJ kasi nga may sumabit na media practitioner sa criminal at civil o administrative cases.

 Please spare the journalists in hostage crisis liabilities

The National Press Club appeals to President Noynoy Aquino and Justice Secretary Leila de Lima to spare the members of the media from any criminal or civil or administrative cases that it may file as a result of the inquiry into the August 23, 2010 hostage drama at the Quirino Grandstand in Luneta Park, Manila.

The NPC issues this statement following the announcement issued by Secretary De Lima that the results of the fact-finding work done by the Incident Investigation and Review Commission (IIRC) showed that mediamen shall be charged in connection with the hostage-taking incident that ended in the deaths of hostage-taker Senior Inspector Rolando Mendoza and that of eight of the tourists from Hong Kong that he held captive inside the bus.

This plea is not only founded on the principle of amity and the need to keep the media free of any scent of distraction that only brings out bad impressions that the government is muzzling the press in the guise of punishing journalists deemed to have erred in the August 23, 2010 hostage crisis at the Quirino Grandstand in Luneta, Manila.

This plea is also founded on the fact that the NPC strongly believes that not one member of the media who covered the hostage drama can be held criminally just because the crisis ended in tragedy.

First, it is very clear that not one of these media men, all from broadcast sector, connived with the hostage-taker. It is also very clear that the journalists merely covered and reported the events as these transpired during the drama. Part of that coverage was the interview of Erwin Tulfo and Mike Rogas to Mendoza. 

Of course, there is no criminal law that punishes the act of interviewing a hostage-taker. There is also no criminal law that punishes the act of covering all incidents in a hostage crisis as these events unfold.

Neither can the journalists who interviewed the hostage-taker be held liable for criminal negligence. It cannot be stretched beyond imagination how the interviews of Tulfo and Rogas to the outraging cop could proximately caused the deaths of those eight HK residents. Proximate cause means that even if there was presence or absence of other interferences the said interview will surely end in the outraging cop into a killing frenzy. For sure, it must have been things other than the interview that drove the hostage-taker to go into an uncontrollable state of mind.

To the contrary, it showed that Tulfo and Rogas were even helping to cool down the hostage-taker.   It showed more that the one that triggered Mendoza into a killing frenzy was the arrest of his brother policeman and relatives, which arrests were seen by him through the television inside the star-crossed bus.   There are sufficient clear and convincing proofs to show that the hostage-taker saw his brother policeman, SPO2 Greg Mendoza, and other relatives being hauled off bodily and that it was this scene that drove him into an uncontrollable rage.   The testimonies and the tape records of the broadcasts of Tulfo and Rogas would show that they convinced Mendoza to give them five minutes to tell the hostage managers to stop the arrest and this five-minute period lapsed out that the amok cop started to go wild.

Now, there can also be no criminal liability on the part of the television crewmen and anchormen and radio reporters who broadcast live the arrest of the relatives of the hostage-taker. They did not intend to egg on the outraging cop for their obvious intention was not to make Mendoza go wild but only to deliver to the world the news scenes as they happened.    Also, these newsmen did not have any idea that there was a television inside the bus and that the hostage-taker was monitoring the arrest of his relatives.   Then, at that time, the brother of Mendoza sought out the help of the media men while he was being arrested, the reason that the cameras were focused on him at that nick of time when nobody among them could have thought it would trigger Mendoza into an uncontrollable obfuscation.

So that if there were persons who should be charged with MULTIPLE HOMICIDE THROUGH RECKLESS IMPRUDENCE, IT SHOULD BE THE OFFICERS ON THE GROUND WHO RECKLESSLY DISREGARDED THE NEED TO FOLLOW THE PNP MANUAL FOR THE MEDIA COVERAGE OF A HOSTAGE CRISIS.

And if these media men cannot be held liable criminally, there is also no justification for a civil or administrative liability for each of them or their broadcasts franchises, respectively.