A MEDIAMAN who allegedly posted the photograph and videos of a naked and unconscious rape victim in his social-media account has been charged by the local police with video voyeurism.
The Tagum City police filed the case against Jorge Pangandoyon, a radio blocktimer ang publisher of a local weekly tabloid.
Senior Insp. Anjanette Tirador, chief of the Tagum Women’s and Children’s Desk and Police Officer 2 Asanie Avila signed the charge sheet against Pangandoyon.
On Thursday morning, Pangandoyon was invited by the local police for investigation into the social-media post, but reports said when he arrived at the police station, he was told by Tirador that charges for alleged violation of Republic Act 9995, or the Anti-Photo and Video Voyeurism Act of 2009, would be filed against him for the video post he made on the rape suspect.
Pangandoyon said that he posted the video to help in spreading information about the crime that would lead to arrest of the assailant who raped the woman, who was living in an apartment about five houses from Pangandoyon’s house.
He said that the victim could have died had the onlookers, including him, not took her immediately to the nearest hospital.
The victim, a worker of a catering service in a nearby mall, was found naked and hogtied with her own clothes and an electric cord at around 3 p.m. on Wednesday by her coworkers who saw her through the half-open door of the apartment.
The victim reportedly lived alone in the apartment, but allowed her coworkers to cook their food in there.
When her coworkers returned to the apartment, they found the door half-open and the victim lying naked and unconscious on the floor.
Pangandoyon said that upon discovery of the crime, one of victim’s coworkers asked for help from the neighbors, so as a mediaman his instinct was to get his camera to help record the scene of the crime.
By around 5 p.m. Pangandoyon allegedly uploaded a short video and subsequently, another one video, which is longer, with news written in the vernacular.
In the videos, the victim was seen lying naked on her side with her breast covered by her hogtied hands.
The videos became viral among netizens in the city and the province, with the first one earning more than 6,000 views early Thursday morning.
In the longer video, Pangandoyon’s voice can be heard asking emergency help from the city police.
Some netizens commented that Pangandoyon failed to put a blur the videos before he posted them.
The videos were already deleted late Thursday afternoon, but before that, several netizens commented that it was unfortunate that Pangandoyon was first arrested by the police and not the rape suspect, while there had been many cases in the past that netizens uploaded similar and even clearer voyeur videos and photos but the uploaders were not put in jail.