Flight, an admission of guilt

Are highway robbery and illegal detention not serious enough crimes to warrant the immediate detention of suspects in such cases, especially when they are policemen? This question cries out for an answer after five of the 10 police officers seen in a viral “hulidap” video simply walked out in the middle of a court hearing to “escape.”

“They were behind me while I was arguing with the judge to hold off the release of arrest warrants. Then the fiscal suddenly told me: ‘Your clients are no longer here. They escaped. They left the courtroom,’” said the lawyer of the five fugitives who were supposed to be under “restrictive custody.”

Had the suspects not been policemen, they would have appeared in court in handcuffs, guarded by armalite-wielding jail officers. Escape would have been not as easy in the manner by which the five policemen fled the coop, with their lone “custodian” unable or unwilling to stop their “escape.”

But since the suspects were policemen and they were just under “restrictive custody” they were free to leave the court without even saying adieu after it became apparent that arrest warrants against them were being released at that moment.

At the very least, the policemen’s lawyer, being an officer of the court, should ask his clients to immediately surface lest he drop them for making a mockery of the justice system and making him look very bad.

Flight is an admission of guilt, the policemen should be reminded. Likewise, the court should consider the “escape” as an aggravating circumstance when it goes into a full-blown trial.                               ***

Image by Philstar.com