THE PHILIPPINES. MAN SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR RAPE AND MURDER

June 20, 2006: a regional trial court in Bacolod City, the Philippines, meted out the death penalty to 28-year-old Guillermo Manayon Rama Jr. for the rape and killing of a 17-year-old high school student. The court said capital punishment could still be imposed on Rama because the death penalty had not yet been abolished.
Court records showed that Rama was accused of sexually assaulting the victim on October 23, 2000 at a sugarcane field in Barangay Cabug. The victim was then strangled to death and thrown into a canal. Presented in court was an affidavit of the convict wherein he admitted that he brought the girl to the sugarcane field and hit her until she was unconscious. The accused reportedly pleaded guilty to the crime as “his conscience was bothering him”. (Sources: Philippine Daily Inquirer, 20/06/2006)