June 14, 1979 Arrest and Torture Under Philippine Martial Law Part II

The Car Leaves Las Piñas: Off to Camp Crame!

As the car moved, our captors told us to crouch low, obviously to keep us from knowing where we were going. They were probably not sure if the blindfolds were totally covering our vision.

At this point, I had not discounted the possibility that the agents would summarily execute or “salvage” us. Another prospect was being brought to a safe house where we would be interrogated and tortured indefinitely. I also wondered if we were going to be held in single place or in multiple places.

Some ten minutes into this early morning ride , the Ford Escort stopped, after which I felt it going down a steep grade. I surmised that the stop was the tollgate of the South Expressway, and that the incline was the short spur road that led to the expressway. 

As the car regained speed, I imagined that we were already cruising on the said road. The two agents at the front were calm and did not talk to each other. There was no radio chatter in the car either. I did not sense any traffic stops. After about 30 minutes or so into the ride, I sensed that daylight was breaking.

A Large Parking Lot, and an Ironing Board

About 45 minutes after we left Las Piñas, I felt the car stop. I instinctively raised my head, and from the teensy peephole of my blindfold, I saw that we had pulled into a large parking lot.

I was hugely relieved at this sight, because it told me we were in some kind of urban facility, certainly not the kind of remote place where people were finished-off. My projections of our group not being “salvaged” were further buoyed when we were led out of the car and ushered into what I sensed was a good-sized building.

Inside the building, they made me sit behind something I could lay my head and my weary, cuffed arms on. I then realized that the platform was nothing else but an ironing board! Horror of horrors, I thought they were going to torture me with an electric iron, like what I had read in a Task Force Detainees (TFD) publication.

Dreadful visions of other detainees being ironed at the soles of their feet came to my mind. I quickly grit my teeth and prepared for that eventuality. Perhaps it added to my fears that I was barefoot, having left my just-bought Otto shoes in Las Piñas.  While pretending to sleep, I nudged my blindfold upwards a bit, so I could survey the surroundings.

It helped that my blindfold was very loose now. In fact, I had practically achieved unobstructed vision in my left eye. I just had to hide it from the agents.

Our Detention Room: Handcuffed to Iron Beds at Night

From my “sleeping” position, I saw the room. It was about 15 meters long and 10 meters wide. There was a single door, to my left, and in front of me were about 3 large windows with steel bars placed vertically.

It did not look like a prison cell at all, more like a dormitory. There were 2 to 3 kapok cushioned beds, an upholstered couch, and some chairs. It was well lit, both by fluorescent lights, and sunshine, which the windows allowed generously.  

My companions were already there, seated, blindfolded and handcuffed. We were placed randomly and evenly across the room. I distinctly remember seeing Judith Reyes Fabic in one corner. In that instant, I thought of Judith’s 2-year old daughter Tala, who was not with us in Las Piñas.

Save for several escorted trips to the bathroom, I was to remain in this position until noontime, when someone woke me up and placed food on the ironing board.  Lunch consisted of rice and sautéed sayote or upo. They were placed separately in two plastic bags.

Lunch was an opportunity to completely uncover my eyes and survey our detention place. I do not remember now if my companions did the same. I remember finishing my lunch in no time, which I ate by hand straight from the plastic bags. After this, an agent blindfolded me again.

Most of the time detainees while away their time gazing into emptiness and avoiding depression.Photo from Raissa Robles, Tortured Art: Martial Law Detainees Sketch Out Their Pain and Defiance, https://
www.raissarobles.com/2011/09/23/tortured-art-martial-law-detainees-sketch-out-their-pain/

Mug Shot, Ome Candazo

Shortly after lunchtime, it was mug shot taking time. Someone took me to a small room. I read the chalk writing on the small, rectangular blackboard they made me hold. It said: “REYES, R E 14 JUNE ’79 RSU-4.

At about mid-afternoon, someone led me to another place in the room and made me sit on a chair. I then sensed that people other than from our group were in the room. Without warning, someone sat next to me.

That person whispered: “Brod, huli nanaman tayo,” (Brother, we have been arrested again).  Immediately I recognized the voice as that of Romeo “Ome” Candazo, a fraternity brother from the UP Alpha Sigma Fraternity.

Ome Candazo said that jestingly, as was his wont. We had been arrested together 4 years earlier, in the summer of 1975. We were detained with 6 others at Recad 6, Camp Crame. The charge was something like “Public Alarm and Scandal,” stemming from our alleged participation in a fraternity rumble inside UP campus.  

I acknowledged Ome’s greeting, and from behind our blindfolds, we jokingly chatted, albeit in whispers. The light tone helped ease our worries a lot.  

Mar Galang

The next person who approached me I did not recognize by voice, but he introduced himself as Mar Galang. I would later learn from Ome Candazo that Mar Galang was another Alpha Sigma brother. Mar Galang asked me where I was arrested, and I quickly told him: “Princess Plume, Talon Village.” He was surprised to learn that we had been arrested in the same neighborhood.

Up to this time, I had not been able to talk to any person belonging to our group. After my chat with Mar Galang, I remained seated on the chair. It was here that I had dinner, at about 7:30 pm.  It consisted, again, of rice and vegetables.

When bedtime came at about 10 pm, someone led me to lie on a familiar steel-frame bed with a kapok mattress. Someone then uncuffed my left hand, and fastened the freed handcuff to the steel bed. I was now effectively fastened to the green bed.

There was not a pillow, nor a blanket. I assumed a fetal position, not minding that I had not brushed my teeth, nor washed my face. It was in this basic position that I slept all night, because the handcuffed right hand kept me from turning. I assumed my companions were also handcuffed to their beds.

In the morning of our 2^nd day, with the blindfolds gone, we were allowed to move freely in the detention room, though still handcuffed. We were so glad and excited to be able to talk to each other at last.

Two Groups Meet

All of us were there: Geoffrey “Jun” Fabic, Judith Fabic, Elorde “Eloy” Calimoso, Augusto “Augut” Añonuevo, Jeremias “Jerem” Celestino, Sylvia “Ibyang” Flores, Avelina “Ave” Enrile, Ruth Santos, Rolando Marañon, and myself.

The other group of detainees was also allowed to loosen up in the room. After initially meeting Ome Candazo and Mar Galang, I finally met the rest of them. I had suspected all along that the June 14, 1979 arrest bagged not just 1, but 2 groups of activists.

One by one, I saw them, as they entered the room.  Some of them washed up at the single sink and faucet in the room. They were: Edgar “Edjop” Jopson, Winifred “Wingie” Villamin, Josefina “Jocabs” Cabuniag, Oscar “Oca” Armea, and Caridad “Caring” Magpantay.

Edgar Jopson

Edgar Jopson greeted me by my nickname. He then told our group to tell as many relatives and friends who would visit that he had been arrested. He even pronounced, with his slightly baritone voice, his first name, middle name, and surname as he sought our help.

This was a huge change for me because, the past 3 years since I first met him in 1976, he had always prudently assumed various aliases, like “Archie” and “Lem.” However, these aliases were futile, because almost everybody in the underground knew his real name, he being a famous student leader in the golden years of the Philippine student movement.

The latter codename, to me, was the most memorable. “Lem” was short for “Golem” which, in turn, was a name given to giants in Philippine lore. Edgar Jopson was a diminutive man even by Philippine standards, and “Lem,” of course, was used humorously.

We always assumed that the military also knew him, and tried our best to avoid being with him in public places. And here he was, almost shouting, virtually announcing to the world, that Edgar Gil Jopson had been captured!

Even My Mother Recognized Edgar Jopson

Edgar Jopson was so well known that even my mother recognized him when he knocked at the side door of our house in Maysantol, Bulacan, Bulacan, sometime in 1977. He was then asking for instructions regarding a meeting venue, which happened to be my grandfather’s 19th century house. My mother noted that he was very polite. My brother Luis Reyes, who went to Ateneo, also recognized him when he returned to our house a few months after.

That same house, by the way, was the site of many Katipunan meetings during the Philippine Revolution.     

Edgar Jopson was 30 years old when we were arrested. He had large bags under his round eyes, a greatly receded hairline, a bald pate more than 2 inches across, and a bushy moustache. He was wearing a “sando” undershirt.

The 1970 Ten Outstanding Young Men (TOYM) awardee was wiping his face and underarms with a wet face-towel or “bimpo” as he spoke to us. His persona radiated calmness and self-confidence, which blended well with his exclusive boys’ school demeanor.

Edgar Jopson’s group stayed in the room for almost an hour. The males and females from the two groups huddled separately. I chatted lengthily with Winifred Villamin, Oscar Armea, Ome Candazo, and Mar Galang. I asked them such things as if they were tortured, have they been visited by relatives, and how they were coping with the situation.

Regional Security Unit-4

From them I learned such details as our detention place, which was Camp Came, and the intelligence unit that apprehended us. Our arresting unit was “Regional Security Unit-4” or RSU-4. Its head was Col. Ishmael Rodrigo, while the one who commanded the operation was Capt. Robert Delfin.

Another person who they thought mattered was bald and bespectacled Atty. Virgilio Saldajeno, who, we later learned, was attached to the Judge Advocate General’s Office (JAGO), but who, for some reason, participated in intelligence work.

I further learned from Ome Candazo that RSU-4 was the new name of the infamous Constabulary Security Unit (CSU), that dreaded unit prominent for its extra-judicial killings of political captives.   

Edgar Jopson’s group then returned to their separate detention place, which I did not get to see during our entire stay in Camp Crame. They would, however, be allowed to stay in our room every day, starting in the morning, but for only a few hours. This would be the basic pattern in our more than 2-week stay at Camp Crame.

Oscar Armea is Tortured in the Genitals with Electric Current

One morning, at about 7 am, a shaken Oscar Armea had a terrifying story to tell. He only shared it with us male detainees. It must have been our 6^th day in Camp Crame.  He had been woken at about 2 am and interrogated by 4 or 5 agents in a small room. During the questioning, which lasted more than hour, Oscar told us the agents had repeatedly applied an electric current on his genitals.

Oscar Armea showed us his penis and it was bleeding. Displaying his working class grit, and his story over, Oscar Armea nonchalantly covered his genitals and started eating breakfast. But the scary message had been communicated: starting that day, anybody among us could be roused from sleep at the most unholy hour and be interrogated and tortured. The terror was palpable, although we only spoke about it in whispers.

This is how Oscar Armea looked when he came out of the interrogation room. For two weeks, we were handcuffed day and night. At night, the handcuffs were fastened to the steel beds, called "tarima." Photo from Raissa Robles, Tortured Art: Martial Law Detainees Sketch Out Their Pain and Defiance, https://www.raissarobles.com/2011/09/23/tortured-art-martial-law-detainees-sketch-out-their-pain/

 

The next morning, it was Mar Galang’s turn to tell a story. He too, had been interrogated early at dawn and for more than hour. But this time, he told us, the goons had made him lean, shirtless, against a functioning window air conditioner. I do not remember now if Mar got pneumonia or influenza, or a cold, or if he passed out because of this horrific cruelty. But I do remember it terrified us even more.

On another morning, Geoffrey Fabic returned from a 3 am to 7 am interrogation with a terrifying story to tell. He related to us that during the interrogation, agents forced him to play "Russian Roulette." He told us that when the agents had run out of questions, or just to scare the wits out of him, they loaded just one round into a revolver, spun it, handed it to him, and compelled him, under pain of physical torture, to squeeze the trigger.  

We Lock Arms: Itigil ang Torture!

But these captive activists would not simply grin and bear it. That morning, we dared lock arms inside the room, all 17 of us, and shouted repeatedly something like “Itigil ang torture!” After 5 to 7 tense minutes, some unidentified agents about our age entered the room and told us to stop. One slightly older agent who displayed authority yelled at us for 2 times:  “We can salvage you anytime we want!”  

We decided not to push our luck. We stopped the brief protest and settled down to our seats. We assessed the situation and concluded that it was better that we conducted the protest than we did nothing at all. It was a preemptive move, although a calculated one, we told ourselves. After a few minutes, I was summoned by Captain Robert Delfin, and we talked at the building's front entrance, which I was seeing for the first time.

I did not know why I was singled out among the detainees. I surmised they must have thought I was the leader of the protest, because before we locked arms, I had angrily confronted an agent who had come into the room to give us a look. Captain Delfin was firm but conciliatory, and tried to explain the military’s side. I told him we will continue the protest if they keep up the torture.

Events would prove us right: from then on, the interrogations continued, with each of us being grilled separately. The difference was that they merely threatened to torture us (which was nerve-wracking as it was) but did not actually do so. 

Edgar Jopson Escapes

On an unforgettable night, we were awakened by shouting, lights being turned on, cars and motorcycles starting, and frenzied activity by many people just outside our room. We even heard a child crying. We did not mind the ruckus because it abated after about 30 minutes. When morning broke, we were surprised that Edgar Jopson’s group was not allowed to enter our room and mingle with us.

We learned, that same morning, from guards that we had befriended, that the unthinkable had happened: Edgar Jopson had escaped. The commotion that ensued was nothing but startled RSU-4 operatives rushing off their posts to pursue Edgar Jopson.

This was Edgar Jopson during his student days at Ateneo. He headed the moderate National Union of Students of the Philippines (NUSP). During martial law, he was radicalized by his trade union activities and decided eventually to join the Leftist underground. His group occupied the other house, apart from that where we were captured, which the military raided in the dawn hours of June 14, 1979.  Their house was just 10-15 meters away from us.  

The crying child, it turned out, was Jopson’s son, Noy, who was left in Crame with his nanny. Apparently, and unbeknownst to us, Edgar Jopson had arranged with our captors to have his boy sleep in the stockade. I surmised the child was in the underground house when they were captured. We never knew what happened to the child after this incident.

This was Edgar Jopson as the military took a mugshot of him at the Regional Security
Unit (RSU) headquarters at Camp Crame after the June 14, 1979 arrests at Las Piñas.

Although we were apprehensive about this event because of the possible repercussions, we silently rejoiced at Edgar Jopson’s getaway. He had intimated to us his intentions to escape the first day that we saw him in Camp Crame, but we never made much of it. We did not know how serious he was.

More Activists Are Arrested and Tortured at the Las Piñas House

From one of the visitors, we learned what had happened at the Las Piñas house after our arrest. Another activist who was to attend our conference, whose name I cannot reveal at this writing, arrived at the house at about 10 am.

When he knocked at the front door, it opened, and he was met, to his face, by the muzzle of an M16. He thought it was a prank. He jokingly told the wielder: “Kasama, masamang biro yata yan.” (Comrade, I think that’s a cruel joke)

Instantly after he said that, the door swung open.  He was accosted by more armed agents, who had been waiting. It was standard procedure. He was then interrogated and tortured for quite a long time in the living room, reportedly until late afternoon.

During one pause, he was brought to an upstairs room. What he saw would have buckled weaker hearts.

Our Courier is Captured and Sexually Abused

Another activist, a courier named Doris, was also being interrogated and tortured. She had arrived much earlier, at about 7 am, or 3 hours after we had been hauled off.

In her early 20s, Doris was seated on a chair completely naked, with 5 or 6 agents questioning, slapping, and touching her. Incredibly, Doris was keeping her composure, answering the questions evasively, and outwitting the agents. Several times she was on the verge of breaking down, but held on valiantly.

She told the agents to take it easy with her, as she was having her monthly period. Instead of heeding her plea, the agents took a bottle of ketchup from the kitchen, inserted the bottle into her vagina, and let the red liquid flow, enough to cover her delicate area. She took the mockery all in stride, with nary a trace of emotion.

After seeing this, the other activist was taken back to the living room and the interrogation and torture continued. He was reportedly released the next day and not detained ---- he struck a deal with the military to be an asset within the underground movement: a deal he did not keep.

As for the unflinching Doris, she was detained for some time, and released. She went back to the movement. I don't know what has happened to her ever since.      

Sixto Carlos Sr.

On another day, while we were having lunch, our attention was called by a male person, just outside our door, shouting: “Where is my son?” quite repetitively. We were already free from our handcuffs, and allowed to roam freely in the room. Even the escorts to the bathroom were now gone. In other words, I was free to open the lone door by myself, which was unlocked.

When I looked outside our room, I saw a man, of average built and height, in his early sixties, and dressed in light pants and polo-barong. With his gray hair, he looked very distinguished. He was walking hurriedly up and down the corridor, looking into every cell. While I watched, he must have twice shouted “Where is my son?”

The man was Sixto Carlos Sr., the father of long missing activist Sixto Carlos Jr. At that time, Sixto Carlos Jr. had been missing for almost two months, and his family was afraid he might have been “salvaged.” It turned out that he was arrested in Mandaluyong with no witnesses, and kept in solitary confinement in a safehouse, and heavily tortured. It took his family 4 months to find him. The fact that his father was a former military man helped a lot.

We Meet Commander Dante

Yet another notable experience we had during our Camp Crame detention was when we were allowed to have 30 minutes of outside exposure or “sunning” as the agents would call it, in a secured and sunlit courtyard in the building. It was our third time to do so, with the first 2 outings being uneventful.

Suddenly, two hands began reaching out behind a concrete wall, as if someone was jumping so we would see his/her hands. Before we knew it, that someone had held on to the wall to support himself, showed us half his body, and talked to us just long enough before his arms grew weary, and he fell back again.

The man was the legendary Commander Dante, aka Bernabe Buscayno, founder of the New People’s Army. His arms and upper torso were thin and lithe, and his face was very ordinary looking. He was captured in 1977, and had been detained in that building ever since. In the 3 times that he popped up from his wall, he introduced himself, commended us for what we were doing, and  advised us to escape.

My Parents Visit Me

The most touching part of my detention at Camp Crame was when my parents, Domingo Coronel Reyes, and Eneida Enriquez Reyes, visited me. At the time of my arrest, I had not been on speaking terms with my father, over a very petty thing, like he did not intervene when my younger brother got into a fight with a town toughie in Bulacan. The spat had been going on for nearly two years, and it had gone into a stalemate because two proud egos would not give in.

My eyes welled with tears as I saw my parents sitting side-by-side in Atty. Virgilio Saldajeno’s office. I had realized then how much my father and mother loved me. I had expected my mother to visit me the first time she could. She tearfully told me that she had burned all my “subversive” materials in my cabinet, and that she, at 56, wasn’t getting any younger.

But with my father, who had Kapampangan pride so tough, he would not sacrifice it for all the money or power in the world, it was different. Here he was, humbling himself before me by being the one to break the ice in our silly standoff. He spoke to me as if nothing had happened between us. They even brought me two bags of groceries!   

What is more, he whispered to me that he and my mother were proud to have a son who was an activist! That day, I was sure, I was a winner. Not only did I have parents who loved me, I had parents who believed in me and supported my cause. Back in my bed, I cried like a child.  

Atty. Virgilio Saldajeno and Col. Ishmael Rodrigo

Atty. Saldajeno informed my parents that we would soon be moved to Bicutan Rehabilitation Center (BRC), somewhere in Taguig, Metro-Manila. As he spoke, I looked at Atty. Saldajeno with disguised but seething anger, because Oscar Armea had mentioned his name as one of those who tortured him with electric current. Oscar even said that Atty. Saldajeno even instructed his interrogators to increase the voltage when it appeared he was withstanding it.

Two days before we were transferred to BRC, both groups had a meeting with the head of RSU-4, Col. Ishmael Rodrigo. He was a man in his mid-fifties, graying, but looked fit, as I expected military people would look.  He was mild mannered, Chinese-looking, and spoke to us with respect. It was a great departure, I thought, from the unnerving treatment we had been getting from his subalterns.

I was to learn later that Col. Ishmael Rodrigo was a WWII and Korean War veteran, and had been active in the anti-Huk campaign during the Magsaysay administration.  

It was mostly pleasantries that we exchanged. Things like family and educational background, and what caused us to join the movement. We were very kind and open to Col. Rodrigo, reciprocating his civil treatment of us.

Someone from the group even jokingly asked him about his anti-communism. We were, however, very careful, lest we reveal delicate or operational information. He did not, to be fair, appear to be fishing for information.

Rogue’s Gallery

That night, at about 10 pm, we encountered a final bout with psychological torture. We were all blindfolded, and handcuffed, and led single file to someplace outside the room. Finally, were made to sit at one end of a dimly lighted and long corridor. I assumed Edgar Jopson’s group was with us, because of the familiar voices I heard.

They let us sit there for 5 to 10 minutes. They then removed our blindfolds. Suddenly, what seemed like a hundred klieg lights opened up, from the other end of the corridor, blinding our eyes. At the same time, we heard persons filing in, seemingly occupying both sides of the hall, with the middle part left empty.  All of us thought this was some kind of macabre form of torture, or RSU-4’s version of a collective “third-degree” interrogation.

At any rate, I told myself, if I would hear rifles being cocked as in a firing squad, I would not be surprised. I could have sworn I heard sobs and nervous shaking in our group. However, everything remained eerily silent, and the people before us just stood there. It was as if they were just observing us. But we were prepared for the worst.

Agents Descend on RSU-4

After about 20 minutes, they turned off the lights, led us out of that dark place, and back to our room. Over breakfast the following morning, we talked about the experience and how frightening it was. We were, however, totally clueless on what it was all about. 

Later, when we were already in BRC, the other detainees explained it to us.

It was the military’s way of letting other intelligence units identify us, or memorize our faces, and they did it routinely. It was RSU-4 which arrested us, but other intelligence units, like Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (ISAFP), National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA), and Military Intelligence Service Group (MISG) were also interested in us, to add to their data base.

That encounter was some kind of identification session, a rogue’s gallery if you will.  The people whom we felt entered the room were sundry agents representing these other intelligence units including their regional units. In all probability, they said, these observers included intelligence bigwigs like Col. Rodolfo Aguinaldo (RSU-4) and Col. Rolando Abadilla (MISG). It was an inter-agency coordination thing. The lights were, of course, so we could not see their faces.

Off to Bicutan

We were detained at RSU-4 Camp Crame for slightly more than 2 weeks. I would estimate it was around July 2 or 3 1979 when, handcuffed, we were loaded on an open military truck and transported, with armed escorts, to BRC. I remember passing through what is now Bonifacio Global City on the way to Taguig. Fort Bonifacio had many acacia trees. It was a sunny day.