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This document summarizes the key aspects of the Anti-Torture Law in the Philippines. It defines torture, both physical and psychological, and outlines specific acts that are considered torture. It also discusses provisions for protecting witnesses, requiring monthly detention center reports, and establishing rehabilitation programs for victims. However, investigators, prosecutors and judges do not always properly interpret violations of torture, weakening the law's ability to eliminate torture.
This document summarizes the key aspects of the Anti-Torture Law in the Philippines. It defines torture, both physical and psychological, and outlines specific acts that are considered torture. It also discusses provisions for protecting witnesses, requiring monthly detention center reports, and establishing rehabilitation programs for victims. However, investigators, prosecutors and judges do not always properly interpret violations of torture, weakening the law's ability to eliminate torture.
This document summarizes the key aspects of the Anti-Torture Law in the Philippines. It defines torture, both physical and psychological, and outlines specific acts that are considered torture. It also discusses provisions for protecting witnesses, requiring monthly detention center reports, and establishing rehabilitation programs for victims. However, investigators, prosecutors and judges do not always properly interpret violations of torture, weakening the law's ability to eliminate torture.
CRUEL, INHUMAN AND DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT AND PRESCRIBING PENALTIES THEREFOR Torture is abhorrent. Torture is illegal. Yet torture is inflicted on men, women and children in the Philippines and well over half the countries around the world. GIST OF THE LAW
The Anti-Torture Law criminalizes all forms of
torture — physical, mental, psychological and pharmacological (the latter is done through administering drugs) Acts Punishable • Physical torture – is a form of treatment or punishment inflicted by a person in authority or agent of a person in authority upon another in his/her custody that causes severe pain, exhaustion, disability or dysfunction of one or more parts of the body, such as: • a. Systematic beating, head banging, punching, kicking, striking with truncheon or rifle butt or other similar objects, and jumping on the stomach; b. Food deprivation or forcible feeding with spoiled food, animal or human excreta and other stuff or substances not normally eaten c. Electric shock; d. Cigarette burning; burning by electrically heated rods, hot oil, acid; by the rubbing of pepper or other chemical substances on mucous membranes, or acids or spices directly on the wound(s); e. The submersion of the head in water or water polluted with excrement, urine, vomit, and/or blood until the brink of suffocation; f. Being tied or forced to assume fixed and stressful bodily position; g. Rape and sexual abuse, including the insertion of foreign objects into the sex organ or rectum, or electrical torture of the genitals; h. Mutilation or amputation of the essential parts of the body such as the genitalia, ear, tongue, etc.; j. Pulling out of fingernails; k. Harmful exposure to the elements such as sunlight and extreme cold; l. The use of plastic bag and other materials placed over the head to the point of asphyxiation; • m. The use of psychoactive drugs to change the perception, memory. alertness or will of a person, such as: • i. The administration of drugs to induce confession and/or reduce mental competency; or • ii. The use of drugs to induce extreme pain or certain symptoms of a disease; and • n. Other analogous acts of physical torture; Mental or Psychological Torture –refers to acts committed by a person in authority or agent of a person in authority which are calculated to affect or confuse the mind and/or undermine a person’s dignity and morale, such as: a. Blindfolding; b. Threatening a person(s) or his/her relative(s) with bodily harm, execution or other wrongful acts; c. Confinement in solitary cells or secret detention places; d. Prolonged interrogation; e. Preparing a prisoner for a “show trial”, public display or public humiliation of a detainee or prisoner; f. Causing unscheduled transfer of a person deprived of liberty from one place to another, creating the belief that he/she shall be summarily executed; g. Maltreating a member/s of a person’s family; h. Causing the torture sessions to be witnessed by the person’s family, relatives or any third party; i. Denial of sleep/rest; j. Shame infliction such as stripping the person naked, parading him/her in public places, shaving the victim’s head or putting marks on his/her body against his/her will; k. Deliberately prohibiting the victim to communicate with any member of his/her family; and l. Other analogous acts of mental/psychological torture. Non-applicability of Exclusionary Rule (Section 8)
Any confession, admission or statement
obtained as a result of torture shall be inadmissible in evidence in any proceedings, except if the same is used as evidence against a person or persons accused of committing torture. Torture as a Separate and Independent Crime (Section 15)
Torture as a crime shall not absorb or shall not
be absorbed by any other crime or felony committed as a consequence, or as a means in the conduct or commission thereof. In which case, torture shall be treated as a separate and independent criminal act whose penalties shall be imposable without prejudice to any other criminal liability provided for by domestic and international laws. The law also requires the military and police to submit a monthly report listing all its detention centers, including safehouses, to the CHR The law also includes provisions for the protection of complainants and witnesses and persons involved in the prosecution and the establishment of a rehabilitation program for victims. Under the Anti-Torture Law, an act of torture is defined in line with the Convention against Torture (CAT), which means inflicting physical and psychological pain on a victim for purposes of extracting a confession. But the investigators, prosecutors and the judges put a personal interpretation on the violation of torture which effectively defeats any sort of remedy to eliminate torture. The Philippine government approved a Comprehensive Rehabilitation Programs for Torture Victims which was crafted by inter-agencies headed by the Commission of Human Rights (CHR) • To provide medical, psychosocial interventions and legal services to victims and their families.
• To provide support services and
compensation/ reparation to victims and their families to meet their needs through linkages and referrals with other agencies/organization.