Senator’s 'granddaughter' seeks help in rape case

A 16-year-old girl who claims to be a distant granddaughter of administration Sen. Manuel Lapid has asked the senator to help her after she was gang-raped in Bataan province in May. The Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC) scored police for allegedly coddling the four suspects, who were allowed to go home even after the victim had identified them. "Instead of locking up the suspects after they were identified, he told the victim to marry one of them. He then sent the four home," VACC founding chair Dante Jimenez said over radio station DZBB Monday. Jimenez said the VACC will ask Lapid to help in the case, saying the victim's mother Elvira Lapid-Manuel had claimed to be a relative of the senator. Jimenez said information they gathered indicated the girl was raped after a drinking session in Hermosa town on May 21. At the time, he said the girl's friends invited her to watch volleyball in Rivera village in the said town. Jimenez said the girl felt dizzy after drinking juice, and when she regained her senses, she found herself being raped inside a passenger jeep allegedly owned by the town mayor, Efren Cruz. The girl's family sought police assistance, and police rounded up the four suspects, two of whom were minors and one of whom was the local village chieftain’s son. "But the investigator, SPO4 Nicanor Leyba, told the victim to just marry the suspect. The victim's parents are sad because the suspects were sent home," Jimenez said. - GMANews.TV