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Yebra: No need to subdue Mendoza in early hours of hostage crisis


(Updated 5:55 p.m.) — The chief negotiator during the August 23 hostage crisis said that during the early hours of the standoff, he did not see the need to subdue Rolando Mendoza who, at that time, was holding hostage 21 Hong Kong tourists and four Filipinos. On Monday, during the Incident Investigation and Review Committee (IIRC)'s inquiry proceedings, the negotiator, Superintendent Orlando Yebra, asked for an executive session to discuss why he did not opt to to subdue the hostage-taker, who shot to death eight of his foreign hostages just before he himself was killed. "Can I just answer that in an executive session? That is part of the negotiation strategy already. I might be educating other hostage-takers in the future. There is no necessity yet at that time for us to grab or subdue him," Yebra said, adding that only general guidelines are included in the police's crisis management manual. "Let us look at the extreme necessity," he added. However, review committee member Herman Basbaño asked him, "Don't you think the extreme necessity has been negated by the result?" Yebra replied, "Can we discuss that in an executive session?" PNP manual on hostage crises Earlier in the proceedings, Yebra said the Philippine National Police (PNP) has yet to come up with a comprehensive manual for dealing with hostage-taking incidents. Yebra said in 2007, he proposed the creation of a manual for handling hostage incidents but the PNP has yet to act on it. "I proposed for that creation already. In the PNP, we still do not have that hostage negotiation manual," said Yebra. He added that the PNP has no official hostage negotiating team and that no intelligence team was present during the August 23 hostage crisis. Yebra only said that as far as he knows, the Manila Police District's intelligence unit was handling the intelligence matters. "Until this time, the PNP does not have a negotiating unit, an officially-created negotiation unit... The negotiating team is not yet existing until now," he said. Yebra said in a hostage crisis, an official negotiating team should be be composed of a team leader, a primary negotiator, a secondary negotiator, an intelligence reprensentative, and a board man to record everything that is happening. However, during last August 23, it was only he who acted as the chief negotiator with Chief Inspector Romeo Salvador as his assistant. Malacañang, however, said there was a PNP manual on hostage-taking that authorities are now updating. "To my knowledge, there are manuals, there's a police manual on hostage taking," said presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda. "We are now reviewing the manuals and updating them." "We are currently reviewing the Philippine National Police independent of the probe, what happened during that incident and what were the deficiencies found in the PNP," he said, adding that the "internal" review findings will be disclosed within the week. Meanwhile, IIRC member Roan Libarios asked, "There was no formal coordination between you and (the MPD's) intel unit?" Yebra replied: "In fact, in all of these groups, we had no formal exchanges." Yebra's statement that the PNP does not have an official manual on handling hostage crises seemed to contradict the one given by Salvador, his assistant during the negotiations. Over the weekend, Salvador testified before the IIRC that he wanted to subdue Mendoza but Yebra reportedly prevented him from doing so. (See: Negotiator: I wanted to subdue hostage-taker but I was not allowed) Salvador said that according to Yebra, it was against the "hostage manual" to subdue Mendoza in the middle of the negotiation. "May time na magkalapit kami ni Mendoza... I recommended na dambahin ko na lang the first time na nagkalapit kami," Salvador said. "Pero hindi ako pinayagan ni Col. Yebra kasi hindi daw naaayon iyon sa hostage manual."

Yebra said MPD head Chief Superintendent Rodolfo Magtibay named him the chief negotiator on August 23 because of his training in handling hostage crises. "I attended the hostage negotiation course in Louisiana State Police Academy in 2002 and I attended also other hostage negotiation trainings sponsored by international police organizations," said Yebra. As Yebra was testifying before the committee, SPO2 Gregorio Mendoza, brother of the slain hostage-taker, was brought out of the conference room. Hostage crisis Yebra also claimed that at 3 p.m., Mendoza planned to fire a warning shot because his demand to speak with a female reporter and a cameraman was not met. "He is really intending to fire that first shot 3:00 p.m. pa lang," he said. Before the planned warning shot, Mendoza has posted the handwritten message "3 PM DEADLOCK" and later "MEDIA NOW." As the day dragged on, Yebra said the local crisis management committee headed by Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim decided to enlist the help of Mendoza's brother. "I was not the one interviewing Gregorio. It was Mayor Lim asking him questions. They (local crisis management committee members) decided his (Gregorio's) presence is extremely necessary. When I went there (command post), there was already a decision for Gregorio to participate," said Yebra. The tipping point: Rejecting the Ombudsman's letter At about 6: 15 p.m. Yebra, Salvador and the brother went to the bus to deliver a letter expressing Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez's vow to review Mendoza's pending case. Mendoza later became agitated and said the letter was a piece of "trash" because he reportedly wanted an outright decision on the case, whether the hostage-taker's motion for reconsideration was approved or not. After Mendoza rejected the Ombudsman's letter, Yebra said he offered another option where the Metro Manila police would suspend the termination order against Mendoza. The hostage-taker agreed to weigh in the option but Gregorio blurted out, "Tol, di pa binabalik ang baril ko.' (Brother, they haven't returned my gun)." As Yebra, Salvador, and Gregorio left the bus and returned to the command post, Mendoza then fired a warning shot. On Monday's proceedings, Yebra said the firing of the warning shot was "the tipping point." When the two policemen returned to the command post, Yebra then told Lim that Gregorio should be charged for being an accessory to the hostage-taking and for being a co-conspirator with his brother. Lim allegedly then ordered that Gregorio be handcuffed. However, because not one policeman had a handcuff at that time, Lim then ordered that Gregorio to be brought to another police precinct. Lim then decided to go to the nearby Emerald Restaurant because he was hungry and because he thought the situation was "safe" and "peaceful." MPD head Chief Supt. Rodolfo Magtibay later followed him to the restaurant. The so-called arrest of Gregorio Mendoza caused a commotion outside the command post at the Luneta police community precinct. Unknown to Yebra, Lim, and Magtibay, hostage-taker Mendoza saw his brother's arrest from a television set inside the bus. The first shots It is widely believed that Mendoza's anger was further stoked when he saw his brother being arrested. At that point, he opened fire at the hostages. Magtibay, who was still at the Emerald Restaurant, returned to the Quirino Grandstand and ordered the SWAT team to launch an assault. The police shot Mendoza to death but not before he killed eight hostages. On Monday, Yebra admitted that the hostage negotiations were a failure because eight hostages died, even though he managed to get nine hostages released. "Do you admit that it was a failure?" asked Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, head of the IIRC. Yebra replied, "Yes ma'am, because I was not able to take out all of them. Even if there were nine (released), we still cannot say that I was successful. Especially for us negotiators, it is a failure." "Our objective is to save lives of the vicitms, even that of the hostage taker. We do not want even a single one to die," Yebra explained. –VVP/RSJ/KBK, GMANews.TV
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