Tag: hostage

Armed conflict, constitutional law, Criminal law, The News Media, The President

Zamboanga hostage crisis: preliminary notes

       Alas, there are hostages.

      You can condemn this to death until you’re blue in the face,  and you can release tons of press releases on how many laws have been violated … but in the quiet of your situation room (i hope you are already working in your situation room and I hope it is orderly) you’ll still need to draw up scenarios and how to resolve each of them.

 

     Just some notes:

    

     ISA LANG ANG MAGSASALITA! [rough translation: there should only be  one pointman as far as releasing the public statements are concerned – the English translation is more modulated]. Here, you have a local AFP spokesperson releasing info on hostages, a national AFP spokesperson talking about the captors, a local mayor talking about the instructions given by the President, a local governor talking about the peace talks, a Palace spokesperson talking about lawlessness, etc. etc.

      Since lives are at stake here, it might be a good idea to assign only one spokesperson, and this policy   should bind all officials. Pagsabihan mo yung mga nagsasalita nang hindi authorized.

     This one pointman should clear whatever he/she will say with the crisis committee. Please. Hwag kayo bara-bara at magulo.

      Second, for the flow of information, this situation can be considered as — to use the words of the Supreme Court in a case on prior restraint–  “tantamount to war” ,  such that you are authorized to  establish a liaison with the news media to ensure that… lives are not put at greater risk (i can’t use certain words so i hope you’ve caught on… ok, i hope you got this.) You need to appoint a pointman (another pointman for liaison aside from the crisis spokesperson) who is not stupid and who is respected by the news media. Liaison ito. The release and flow of information on the following can be controlled in a situation “tantamount to war”: number and location of troops, troop movements, oplan, details of talks, etc. etc., this is a list, you can ask media law students, i don’t want to be too talkative where hostages are involved.

    

      The rest are operational  and I probably should not write about them (like… you should not assign grandstanding politicians as negotiators, etc. etc…). 

       

breaking news, Criminal law, media law, News, The News Media

Hostage-taking in Manila

Hostage-taking in Manila

i know the police know the protocol in hostage-taking situations. This protocol- playbook is uniform and internationally practised/ recognized; and so, i never Monday- quarterback hostage-taking situations. (when the hostage-taker started shooting inside the bus, the breach, by protocol, was necessary; on the other hand, the daytime early negotiations done by the book, resulting in the release of more than half-a-dozen hostages, to the credit of the local officials, went well; this however leaves us with the 7:20pm spectacle, which resulted in disaster, leaving eight hostages dead). Since the 7:20pm fiasco involved media facilities, maybe i’m allowed to Monday- quarterback that.

The police did not manage the hostage-taker’s access to media facilities; nor to who else was communicating with him from the outside. At worst, the police did not know the hostage-taker had access to television and what kind of media/ communication facilities the bus had.

Because of the mismanagement of the hostage-taker’s access to media facilities and various communication lines and to the media, the hostage-taker viewed the spectacle of his brother, and young nephews and nieces, on the floor, being roughed up by the police in television news blow-by-blow; was enraged, and started shooting. The usual practice is that individuals who are allowed to talk to the hostage-taker are also secured, and their media-interviews, managed. These went south today.

i will not Monday- quarterback the warrantless arrest of the brother even if that involved legal issues because this was a hostage-taking situation maybe he had to be restrained because earlier he reportedly further inflamed his brother- hostage-taker when he allegedly told his brother- hostage-taker “don’t give up until they return my gun to me”; the situation became more volatile when the grappling and scuffle occurred, because the hostage-taker could see it in full, living color on TV. (for that matter, the so-called “arrest” was such a show of bruteness it shouldn’t have been done in such manner but i’m trying not to second-guess that at this time because the hostages’ lives were on the line).

Even with the tried-and-tested hostage-taking protocol-playbook, the police might have missed out on something. Teeny-weeny. The terrain. The terrain is not just Quirino grandstand. It’s the bus. They didn’t research it; what facilities it had inside and outside.They also didn’t manage who else and how many were talking to him from the outside. (okay, i limited myself to media facilities; this incident has a whole a lot of legal and ethical issues — maybe another day.)