PAO asks NBI to exhume unidentified victims of MV Princess of the Stars
November 12, 2009 7:40 pm
MANILA, Nov. 12 – The Public Attorney's Office (PAO) on Thursday asked the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to implement the order of the Cebu City Regional Trial Court (RTC) in connection with the "exhumation" of the "unidentified cadavers" of the victims of the sinking of MV Princess of the Stars owned by Sulpicio Lines, Inc. (SLI).
The PAO is an attached agency of the Department of Justice (DOJ).
In a letter to NBI Director Nestor Mantaring, PAO deputy chief Silvestre Mosing asked that NBI Medico-legal Officer Dr. Renato Bautista be ordered to implement the order issued by Cebu RTC Branch 10 Presiding Judge Soliver Peras.
The court, in an order dated June 29, 2009, granted the PAO's motion to exhume the cadavers of the still unidentified victims following the assistance sought by the relatives of the victims.
The court also ordered the NBI to furnish the PAO all the records in their custody, including the "findings" on the cadavers already identified and the records of the 38 cadavers not yet identified.
The court gave the NBI 15 days within which to submit such records.
The Independent Forensic Group (IFG) had submitted its "exhumation and identification plan," which could help identify the cadavers.
The relatives of the victims earlier wrote the PAO and the IFG to ask for their assistance to identify the remains of the victims, saying that they believed that there were other ways by which to identify their lost love ones.
Earlier, the relatives of the victims did not approve the "mass burial" of the 40 cadavers at the Cosmopolitan Funeral Homes in Cebu on June 21, 2009, which is a year after the sinking of the ill-fated ship. (PNA)
RMA/PTR
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