Thursday, April 16, 2009

Callousness of Authorities to Those Who Grieve

Let me move away from silly things for a while to write about something more current and sensitive.

I was completely shocked to see the news tonight about how the QC police has arrested relatives (sisters and brother) of Ted Failon's wife for obstruction of justice.   Whether Ted Failon's wife committed suicide or not, the fact still remains that she was in her death bed during the arrest.   It was known that the wife has already received extreme unction and that her BP was already very low, 50/95.   Everyone knew it was a very critical case, and she could expire any minute.   

Everyone except the QC police.  Couldn't they have given the relatives courtesy to be beside their sister as she moves on to the next life?  And the manner by which they arrested the "suspects" was contemptible.   Did they have to use brute force?  I am glad the Commission on Human Rights saw something wrong in the way the QC police is handling this case.  

Click on this link to see the arrest of the relatives and view the video below for the CHR's reaction to the arrest.



But don't get me wrong.  I am not taking the side of Ted Failon's camp here.   There are fishy details surrounding this incident and there might be foul play involved after all.   But there is due process.   You don't presume someone is guilty, and from the looks of how the relatives were forcibly taken, they were already treated like criminals.   

Just how callous can you get?  Can being face to face with deaths on a regular basis desensitize you?

I remember a time when I accompanied someone whose mom has passed away the night before to the City Hall to file for a death certificate.   We wanted to know what the procedures were for filing and we approached a certain lady in the concerned department.  Then the lady said, where is the body?  My friend said that the body was taken to a province in Rizal, her birth town and where she will be eventually buried.   Then the lady chastised him because they shouldn't have moved the body without the proper papers.   She was asking him all sorts of questions which my friend couldn't answer for obvious reasons: he was still in shock and in grief for just losing his mother.  

That lady in the City Hall showed no sympathy at all.  She seemed pissed even that he couldn't provide the details she was asking.   She even raised her voice at him. I couldn't believe how she treated my friend.   I was angry at that lady for being utterly insensitive and callous to someone who just suffered a great loss,  and yet, all my friend and I managed to do was hold back our tears and walk away.   

Just how can you lose empathy?  How can you remain unmoved by pleads of compassion or moments of helplessness?  How can you lose your heart?  I don't understand.  I really don't.



No comments:

Post a Comment