Photo by Richard I’Anson. Ifugao Women Transplanting Rice Banaue Philippines. Used here for educational, non-commercial purposes, free service by blog-use of image provided by and from www.allposters.com
When seven armed men in police garb robbed an NFA (National Food Authority ) rice warehouse in Valenzuela yesterday without firing a single shot, we count our blessings, that it was not an angry, hungry mob smashing the gates of rice warehouses everywhere and grabbing supplies. The latter is an untenable situation; unthinkable, uncontrollable; while armed robberies are considered by government bureaucrats to be “still within our fundamental assumptions.” With rice today at 47 to 50 pesos a kilo in Mindanao, the government still considerers the situation manageable.
When the robbery was executed through false pretenses (the suspects pretending to be cops tasked to inspect the granary) and without any fatalities or casualties, we thank our lucky stars that it still falls within the “statistical norm” of robberies (not accompanied by unnecessary killings and predictable, index crimes spike in the weeks before Christmas and in the weeks before opening of classes). Only the RCBC robbery-massacre served to disrupt the usual course of law-enforcement, the usual course being the non-solving of crimes.
If arrested, the crime of robbery in band could be filed against the suspects, as follows:
Quote “Revised Penal Code. Art. 295. Robbery with physical injuries, committed in an uninhabited place and by a band, or with the use of firearm on a street, road or alley. — If the offenses (robbery) XXXX shall have been committed XXXX by a band, XXXX, the offender shall be punished by the maximum period of the proper penalties.
Quote “In the same cases, the penalty next higher in degree shall be imposed upon the leader of the band.
Quote “Art. 296. Definition of a band and penalty incurred by the members thereof. — When more than three armed malefactors take part in the commission of a robbery, it shall be deemed to have been committed by a band. When any of the arms used in the commission of the offense be an unlicensed firearm, the penalty to be imposed upon all the malefactors shall be the maximum of the corresponding penalty provided by law, without prejudice of the criminal liability for illegal possession of such unlicensed firearms.” Closed-quote.
Robbery in band has a slightly higher penalty than robbery in a public building and robbery by pretending the exercise of public authority; so, that’s what you might want to file; that is, if any of these “ordinary robberies” are considered by the PNP to be worth solving.
