The Davao City Police (DCPO) has laid out its initial plans in combatting rape and other sexual crimes during the Consultative Forum Addressing Rape and Sexual Abuse Cases held at the Camp Captain Domingo E. Leonor on Monday.
Police Major Maria Teresita Gaspan, DCPO’s Women and Children Protection Desk Chief, said the police will be bolstering its capacity to respond to sexual abuse cases observed to be rising in the city.
The police recorded 175 cases in 2019, 173 cases in 2020 and 169 cases in 2021.
Monday’s forum was attended by DCPO’s Deputy City Director for Administration Lt. Col. Jed Clamor, Acting City Director Col. Alberto Lupaz, Atty. Charmaine P. Valentin of the Special Council-Violence Against Women from the Integrated Gender and Development Division (IGDD), IGDD head Lorna Mandin, and the Committee on Women chair Councilor Trisha Ann Villafuerte.
Gaspan said there was a need to establish a hollistic anti-criminality forum dedicated to address rape and other sexual crimes. She said such forum should be composed of all agencies concerned, including “schools, barangays, faith-based (groups), other-agencies and other stakeholders.”
There are also plans to add more security personnel in certain police stations to balance out the police-civilian ratio in some areas of the city, Gaspan said.
She added that the DCPO will also be streamlining its referral pathways in responding to rape and sexual abuse cases.
Gaspan said the DCPO’s regular programs geared towards the prevention of sexual crimes– such as inter-agency consultative meetings/conferences, capacity building trainings, school-based and community-based information drive, safe and unsafe touch lectures, barangay pulong-pulong/dialogue, regular patrolling, and raising awareness through traditional media and through social media– will be heightened.
This year, the DCPO’s Sagop Kabataan program, which aims to rescue minors from sexual exploitation, has conducted 2,403 operations, rescuing a total of 1,117 youths. Of these, 817 are male and 320 are female.
During the forum, DCPO director Lupaz ordered the 20 police station commanders in the city to do whatever they can to safeguard the city’s record as one of the country’s safest cities, stressing on the need to eradicate incestuous rapes by conducting “pulong-pulong” or dialogues at the barangay levels.
“The marching order is to downtrend rape cases in your area,” Lupaz said.
The DCPO director said Davao City must continue to live up to its reputation of a child-friendly city.
Lorna Mandin, head of the Integrated Gender and Development Division (IGDD), said the rise in reported rape cases could be a sign that the “culture of silence” among rape victims is slowly being broken down by efforts from various agencies in fighting the stigma against victims of sexual crimes.
She added that the fight against rape is not only the responsibility of the city police but also of the community.
According to the DCPO, Davao City has recorded 98 rape cases from January 1 to August 21 this year. This is a slight increase from the 96 reported cases during the same period last year.
Out of the 98 cases, 89 victims are female and nine are male. Of the cases, 21 were incestuous rape, 45 were committed by an acquaintance of the victim.
Gaspan said all 98 cases are already filed in court with all suspects identified. As of the time of writing, 38 arrests have been made. CIO
