Zubiri calls for reimposition of death penalty

A bill has been filed in the Senate seeking to reimpose the death penalty for persons found to be guilty of heinous crimes, a day after a hostage-taking incident in Manila left eight Chinese tourists dead. Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri said he filed Senate Bill No. 2383 in hopes that reimposing the death penalty would deter the commission of heinous crimes in the Philippines. “Let us restore the death penalty for heinous crimes. I always say, if you do the crime, you do the time. Now I say, if you do a heinous crime, then you can say goodbye to your time," Zubiri said in a privilege speech Tuesday. He said he believes the commission of heinous crimes continues to happen because criminals know that no matter how “barbaric and demonic" their criminal activities are, they will only be meted with life imprisonment. Zubiri specifically cited the August 23 Manila hostage tragedy that killed at least eight people; the kidnapping incident that killed a Korean pastor on the same day; the August 5 bombing of the Zamboanga airport that left two people dead; the August 6 massacre of a retired navy official and his family; and the November 2009 Maguindanao massacre where 57 people were killed. “I sincerely believe that when the death penalty was in place and the execution of the hardened and Godless criminals by lethal injection gets full media coverage, the commission of heinous crimes decreased," he said without providing statistics. The Death Penalty Law or Republic Act No. 7659 was passed in 1992 but was abolished in 2006 by then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo right before she flew to Vatican City to have an audience with the Pope. Under RA 7659, heinous crimes are defined as being “grievous, odious and hateful offenses and which, by reason of their inherent or manifest wickedness, viciousness, atrocity and perversity are repugnant and outrageous to the common standards and norms of decency and morality in a just, civilized and ordered society." - Kimberly Jane Tan/KBK, GMANews.TV