House OKs on second reading bill seeking establishment of separate facility for ‘high-level offenders’

The House of Representatives approved on second reading the measure seeking the establishment of a separate facility for high-level offenders.

House Bill 10355 or the Separate Facility for High-Level Offenders Act was approved during a voice vote on Wednesday's plenary session.

It seeks to establish and maintain a separate, secured and sanitary penitentiary for the custody of high-level offenders serving sentence in the facilities of the Bureau of Corrections.

The bill defines high-level offenders as those individuals convicted of heinous crimes and identified by the BuCor director general as high-risk or high-profile, taking into consideration the offense for which the inmate is convicted, criminal record or history of the inmate, and the affiliations.

The location of the facility will be determined by the Justice secretary and this should be isolated from the general population and other inmates.

The bill said it would be better if the facility is situated within a military establishment or on an island separate from the mainland. It added that Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao should have separate facilities.

Senate President Vicente Sotto III earlier proposed that those considered high-level drug traffickers and other heinous criminals should be separated from other convicts, noting that there should be a national penitentiary for them. — Anna Felicia Bajo/RSJ, GMA News