Six OFWs spared from death penalty in Singapore

Six overseas Filipino workers, including the Filipina maid accused of killing a fellow domestic helper in Singapore, were spared of the death penalty when their sentences were downgraded to jail terms in the different countries where they were detained.

In a report to Malacañang, the Department of Foreign Affairs said the commutation of the sentences was achieved through the efforts of the Philippine government.

Acting Foreign Affairs Secretary Franklin Ebdalin said two more OFWs were awaiting court hearings on the tanazuls or affidavits of forgiveness being executed in their favor by the families of their victims.

The six OFWs were identified as Guen Aguilar, Zenaida Taulbee, Ronilo Arandia, Fernie Salarza, Melvin Obejera and Ma. Fe Cruzado.

Meanwhile, Sarah Dematera and Marilou Ranario are both awaiting the Dammam Grand Court and the Kuwaiti Appellate Court, respectively, to issue orders lifting the death penalty imposed on them.

Aguilar was sentenced to death by a Singapore court for the 2005 killing of fellow domestic worker Jane La Puebla in Singapore. Her death sentence was downgraded to 10 years imprisonment due to her "mental state."

Taulbee was given the maximum penalty of death for her participation in the murder of her husband James in his Aragona Village home in the United States on Jan. 5, 2004. The sentence was, however, lowered to 25 years imprisonment in the US after she pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of conspiracy to commit murder in exchange for her testimony against Reuben Wright and Randy Linniman, her alleged accomplices.

Arandia, a worker of a royal household in Saudi Arabia, was charged for the October 2004 killing of co-worker Jameel Al Rehman, a Pakistani national. His death sentence was reduced to five years imprisonment in a Saudi jail and would be released sometime in 2009.

Salarza, a construction worker in Sudan, was meted the death penalty for killing a fellow Filipino identified only as Berin in January 2006. His penalty now stands at two years imprisonment and payment of blood money amounting to $14,140.

Obejera was charged with killing fellow Filipino Charito Tabag in 2004. He has since been repatriated to the Philippines in August 2006 through the efforts of the government.

Cruzado, who was meted the death penalty for killing an Indian national in 2004, is now serving a 20- to 30-year jail term.

The President brokered the release and mass pardon of 338 Filipinos facing charges with the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, during her four-day state visit to Saudi Arabia in May of last year. — Aurea Calica