Miriam cracks whip on tomb raiders

MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago is seeking stiffer penalties for grave and cemetery robbers to promote further the Filipino culture of respecting the dead.

She said a separate act of robbery under the Revised Penal Code for cemetery items must be legislated.

Santiago’s Senate Bill 2937 defines grave robbery as “the taking of all or part of a tomb, coffin, monument, gravestone, or all or part of a commemorative, decorative, or other cemetery-related article.”

“The law needs to be more specific when it comes to robbery and desecration of graves and tombs. Apart from stealing or destroying property, grave robbers aggravate the grief of those who lost their loved ones and dishonor the final resting place of the deceased,” Santiago said.

Also known as the Anti-Grave Robbers Act, Santiago’s bill also increases the penalty of grave robbers depending on the value of the property taken and the location of the grave or burial ground.

The minimum penalty for grave robbery is six years and one day to 12 years, while the maximum penalty imposed shall be 20 years and one day to 40 years.

“For a country that considers both All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day as national holidays, it is appropriate for our laws to reflect the Filipino’s deep-seated culture of reverence and respect for the dead,” Santiago said.

According to Santiago, grave robbery has always been a problem.

“In a culture as rich as ours, we have always honored our dead with many gifts to commemorate their lives as well as graves fit to be their final resting place. As the time for remembering those who preceded us approaches, a few unfortunate souls would find that the final resting place of their loved ones has been desecrated by grave robbers. The damage done goes beyond the measurable as it not only dishonors the deceased, it also causes anguish to those who survived them,” Santiago said.

She cited a US case that said, “The graveness of an action for desecration of a grave is the mental suffering caused by the disturbance of a loved one’s final resting place.”

“No matter the description of the grave, from the grandiose pyramids to Jean Valjean’s simple and unnamed gravestone, this type of theft must be severely addressed,” she said.