Every time high profile suspects bolt out the jail, especially if it results in a bloody mess, our political leaders are quick to pin the blame on the guards and their immediate superiors. The leaders are fast in asking for heads to roll, saying that the officers are inept, or probably, had been a conspirator in the escape and, therefore, should be relieved at once. In one sweep, they propose laws asking that jail guards who had been remiss of their duties be given stiffer penalties. They even propose that if the escapees had a death penalty as a sentence, or a possible sentence, then the same penalty shall also be meted out to the “errant” jail guards.
These are knee jerk reactions to an endemic problem besetting our jail management. It does not look into the gamut of factors that lead to escape and escape attempts of persons behind bars. It is a solution that will breed more problems than to the one that it purports to solve.
For there is truth beyond what meets the eye.
Our jail system is the least prioritized of all the agencies of the government. It runs with inadequate budget, it lacks custodial facilities, it is manned by inadequate personnel and is deficient with reformatory programs. Coupled to these are the defective evidence gathering of our police forces and the slow pace of the courts in rendering their decision.
Given these basic conditions of our jails, there emerges a unique structure in order to keep our jails moving. Because of the lack of personnel, there develops a “mayores system” wherein inmate leaders are designated special roles to govern their fellow inmates, thus augmenting the jail’s custodial force. In order to supplement the limited budget from the government, the inmates themselves, with the tacit approval of jail authorities, collect money from their fellow inmates, in order to come up with cell funds. These funds are used for the purchase of medicines, for the upkeep of the cell and for other inmate needs. In order to mediate the conflicts, there arise the “jury system” where those who had been “found guilty” can be subjected to “takal” or paddling of the feet and “basag” or breaking one’s skull, depending on the gravity of the “offense”. Because of the delays in the hearings of the cases, the inmates had to find a viable means of existence, from selling cigarettes, to
being a hustler in cara y cruz, a form of gambling using coins, and to trading drugs inside the jail. There are inmates who wanted to protect themselves from the abuses of some jail guards and fellow inmates and thus affiliate themselves with pangkat or gangs, which had more stringent rules than the querna or non-gang members. Some jail officers also join and enhance the system by practicing matik, short for automatic, or the means of giving little favors to inmates in exchange of money or services. Some even go to the extent of becoming a padrino or pusong pangkat to an inmate group, (an ex officio member) and were rewarded for a continuing matik.
With this set up, there is constant power play or bundulan among the different actors. The gangs are continually at odds as to who gets the bigger space or mas maraming bahay o selda or as to who controls the alak trade. The jail guards fight among them as to who could be a patron to whom or as to who should be in charge of offices that have the biggest perk. The inmates quarrel among themselves as to who should be the mayor ng selda and thus, be in charge of the funds and of disciplining fellow inmates.
Thus, the jail is in a perpetual state of structural conflict. The weak and the ignorant are constantly used as pawns in order to forward the interest of wicked persons, be an inmate leader or a jail guard. There are inmate mayores who orchestrate a gang riot, in cahoots with a padrino-jail guard, with kakosa maimed and killed to make it more savage, just so a “strict” warden can be relieved from post. The warden had been very strict or di makatao to their visitors, they will say, but only because the warden had been undermining their drug trade. There were also jail guards who would demolish the stalls of lowly inmates arguing that is against the jail manual and a security risk, only to monopolize later on the purchase of goods in the jail with double mark up for profits and using other inmates as fronts for their businesses.
Thus the inmates were left to fend for themselves. The affluent inmates can buy their freedom out if only they know how the web of corruption works within the system. They can endear themselves to jail guards, win their confidence through matik and leave the jail casually. The downcast and the downtrodden, hoping to see their families one day, have a whole twenty-four a day thinking of means to bolt the jail. There are inadequate reformatory activities and all their creative minds are designed for such intent They wish to be out of a rotting system soon, with all means possible, legal or otherwise.
This had become a recipe for more injustices. An incorruptible jail officer, who had the misfortune of being on duty when a high profile kidnap for ransom suspect finally consummated a yearlong plan of escape, is now charged for ineptitude, and if our legislators will be followed, now faces a possible death sentence. A jail warden, who is dutifully following the directives of the jail manual and true to his professional vows, is immediately relieved from post, because some jail guards who had an eye on his post, ride on the issue when a suspect escaped. They will be remiss of the fact that even a superman cannot guard a dilapidated jail with 2000 inmates using only 10 custodial personnel.
This practice keeps the officers of integrity more entangled to the world of the wolves. It punishes the honest and rewards the crooks.
There are more to escapes than meet the eye. Escapes are but a symptom of the malady that plagued our penal system. Before our leaders indulge in knee-jerk and unfounded conclusions, they should first look unto the holistic structure of our criminal justice system. For in truth, the basic question is: how much concern did we have for the persons behind bars?
