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AN EIGHT-YEAR-OLD girl was sexually assaulted in a toilet at a notorious Philippine prison on New Year’s Day.
The girl, who was visiting her inmate father at Bilibid prison in suburban Manila, was found sprawled on the bathroom floor, naked from the waist down and with a rope tied around her neck.
Initial medical tests did not indicate that she had been raped.
Presidential spokeswoman Abigail Valte told AFP, “The incident involving the eight-year-old is nothing short of deplorable”.
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said an inmate had confessed to attacking the girl and would face additional criminal charges.
“He rendered her unconscious, strangled with the intention of raping her,” de Lima told local broadcaster ABS-CBN.
‘Living like Kings’
The attack is fueling a national uproar over revelations that inmates are “living like kings” with stripper bars and jacuzzis.
The assault came three weeks after a police raid of the prison found stashes of drugs, cash and guns – as well as sex dolls, a stripper bar and a jacuzzi – spread across an astonishing network of air-conditioned “villas” built for powerful crime lords.
One inmate, bank robbery gang leader Herbert Colanggo, had a recording studio in his villa, where he made a full album of love ballads.
Colanggo’s YouTube posts also revealed that he staged elaborate shows inside the prison gymnasium where he was cheered by crowds waving pink pom-poms.
“We are trembling with anger. We are sick and tired of this system,” Dante Jimenez, chairman of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption, told AFP.
Jimenez called on President Benigno Aquino to overhaul the entire prison system and transfer Bilibid to an island, similar to the former maximum-security prison on Alcatraz in the United States.
“They should be surrounded by sharks and crocodiles,” he said.
Bilibid, the nation’s biggest prison, is infamous for overcrowding and brutal conditions – it was built to accommodate 8,900 inmates but currently houses more than 23,000.
Philippine jails have long had a reputation for corruption, but the scale of privileges enjoyed by kingpins at Bilibid shocked the nation.
The government is “taking measures to stop any and all possible criminal acts inside the penitentiary”, Valte said.
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Who would let a child use the bathroom unsupervised in a prison and how the hell was a prisoner able to enter the bathroom??
yeah, little girls that age should be in playgrounds or toy shops not prisons
Read the article, the prisoners run the show in that place. Sounds like they are pretty much free to roam wherever they like. The visitor(s) must have known this. It’s unforgivable to bring a child into that environment and leave her unsupervised.
Have you been to the pillipines, that’s where your answer lies.
Sick sick people……I swear who in there right mind would bring a child into a prison anyhow??’
You do realise the father has his right to see his child. The child has no real rights in this patriarchal system.
Have you any idea the number of children court ordered to spend week ends etc with convicted pedophiles?
Have you any idea the number of children who commit suicide when the judges order them into contact?
No one listens to the children…….and we know this is true in our own country too.
Thats a fairly vague statement to make without backing it up with any real numbers. Knowing first hand how difficult it can be for some father’s to get access to their children when a marriage breaks down I find it difficult to believe the there are very many instances of court ordered visits to a prison to visit a paedophile
The article says it’s severely overcrowded and notorious for it’s brutal conditions but then it also says that they have jacuzzis,strip bars, recording studio? Which is it?
Both… I was in a prison like this in Bolivia when you go in you have nothing and have to work for a living to survive. People open cafés and workshops in their cells to earn money. The prison is mainly run by drug gangs who live in luxury while the rest of the prisoners work for the Gangs. Family’s of all the prisoners are free to come and go as they please and children spend most of their time inside the prison walls..
In the Philippines, they allow conjugal visits and families including the children could visit their inmate father/relative. Years ago when I was still working there as a prison nurse, the program had lessen the gang related attacks particularly in the maximum security compound as they don’t want to loose the visitation rights if they hurt any civilians. Unfortunately due to corruption, over populated/lack of facilities prison, these are now happening.Even the killings of prison officers if they get involved with a powerful prisoner who has “contact” outside the cell is becoming ordinary there. There was a huge difference when they still had the lethal injection but was abolished early 2001.
The dad is partly to blame.
If he hadn’t committed the crime in the first place, it wouldn’t have happened
Pretty ignorant comment. You have no background to why he was in there. Maybe his crime involved defending his child or providing for her in what is a very poor country. Maybe he was falsely convicted in what is a very corrupt country. I would blame whoever thought it was a good idea to bring an 8 year old into this prison, where it seems like the prisoners run the show, let alone letting her out of their sight.
An innocent man does not go to jail
If he didn’t commit the crime, he would be at home and so would his daughter
Big willy style your very wrong
The Guilford 4
Jails contain many innocent people. Many pedophiles walk free and there are plenty of cases all over the world illustrating this. Pedophiles have rights you know.!
Child prostitution is rife in the pillipines and the general population are devout Catholics.
Birmingham6
… isolated case
Guilford 4?
What stupid ignorant comments to make big willy. Either you are a bored attention seeking troll with nothing better to do or else you are completely stupid or maybe even a combination of both.
Actually, now I see where you came up with the name “big willy”
It is what you see hanging from your forehead when you look in the mirror.
Just execute them all like Pakistan did ..
have your say