Rape victim sues priests, nun for kidnapping, obstruction
A 25-year-old woman who earlier accused a priest of rape, filed kidnapping and obstruction of justice charges against a nun and three other priests.
The woman alleged in her five-page affidavit that Sister Serafica Tolentino, and Fathers Robert Amalay, Neil Antenor Cruz and Ramon Masculino detained her for five days in a religious school and coerced her not to file charges of rape against Fr. Martin Alarcon.
Talk of alleged kidnapping and a cover up had already cropped up last week, at a time when the woman filed two charges of rape against Alarcon.
Cruz denied kidnapping nor preventing the woman from filing the case, stressing that they merely offered assistance. Lawyer Cynette Mirasol had said in a radio interview that there could not have been any kidnapping since the woman was free to move and was allowed the use of her mobile phone.
“She always had her mobile phone with her,” Mirasol said.
Using a piece of cloth to hide her face and accompanied by her lawyer, Edeljulio Romero, the woman filed her complaint and affidavit for serious illegal detention and obstruction of justice yesterday morning at the City Prosecutor’s Office. Romero has asked that a preliminary investigation be conducted on the complaint and for the filing in court of the appropriate charges if the evidence warrant.
The complainant alleged that on February 15, the four brought her to stay at the Assumption Convent in Gen. Luna St., City Proper to keep her from the media.
At first, she was convinced that the respondents only wanted to help her. Later, she sensed that the motive why she was being kept away from the media was “…to stop me from filing a case against Father Martin Alarcon and their purpose of forcing me to take medicines so it will appear that I am insane.”
She alleged that Tolentino “saw to it that whenever she is not around at least somebody will look after me and I was not allowed to go out in the room without her or any companion.”
Although Archbishop Angel Lagdameo was not included in the charge, the woman alleged that he tried to stop her from filing a complaint for rape.
“He ask(ed) me to give them time to resolve the incident within the confines of the church and not to file the case outside. After the case was resolved by the church and I am still not contended with the result, then that is the time that I can file the case outside,” the woman stated in her affidavit.
On February 20, Tolentino allowed her to go out with her cousin, but reminded her of a 6 p.m. curfew “or something may happen to me.”
Instead of going back to the convent, she went to a house in Jaro district and met with her lawyer the next day.