(Originally published in the August 19 to 25, 2012 issue of the Baguio Chronicle ---
a weekly newspaper based in Baguio City, Philippines ---
by Sly L. Quintos, Associate Editor.)
A WAVE of condemnation by netizens has spread like a wildfire on social media networks after a Metro Manila motorist was caught on video assaulting a traffic enforcer who called the motorist’s attention for a wrong turn at the corner of Capitol Hills Drive and Tandang Sora in Quezon City.
Robert “Blair” Carabuena, a resourcing supervisor at cigarette maker Philip Morris Fortune Tobacco Corp. (PMFTC), was caught on video by TV5network producers while mauling a Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) traffic enforcer identified as Saturnino Fabros.
“I don't want to imagine what could've happened if this Blair Carabuena had a gun in his car,” Jong D.G. tweeted. Twitter user Kristine said: "One of the reasons why Pinas is not improving is because of some people who think highly of themselves."
“We may have a lot of things against the government but it does not warrant us to act like arrogant douche bags," Vincent Benjamin said via Twitter while Pau Rosales tweeted: “They (MMDA officers) work rain or shine to make sure our traffic situation is somehow bearable, must we abuse them? They are also humans.”
ON July 2, 1991, 25-year-old Eldon Maguan, a De La Salle University engineering student, was driving his car down a one-way street in San Juan and nearly collided with Rolito Go's vehicle, which was traveling the wrong way. The businessman got off his car and shot Maguan who died a few days later.
Go was convicted in 1993 of murder in absentia after he escaped from the Rizal Provincial Jail a few days before the sentencing. Go was finally caught in 1996 in Pampanga and then served his life imprisonment sentence at the New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa. Early this year, Go was transferred from the prison's maximum security facility to the minimum security area, allowing him to walk around the facility without security escorts.
Just this week, the Department of Justice said Go “has gone missing and may have been kidnapped”. Justice Secretary Leila De Lima confirmed that Go has been unaccounted for at the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) since 11:30 p.m. of August 14 during the inmates’ head count.
The assault of Carabuena on Farbos and the killing of Maguan by Go are cases of aggressive or angry behavior by a driver of an automobile or other motor vehicles known as ROAD RAGE.
Road rage is a serious threat to public safety. As an extreme case of aggressive driving, it can be unsafe, thereby threatening other motorists as well as pedestrians. Some transportation experts claim that traffic congestion may be considered as a contributing factor to driver frustration subsequently leading to road rage. It includes rude gestures, verbal insults, deliberately driving in an unsafe or threatening manner, or making threats, leading to verbal altercations, physical assaults, and collisions which result in injuries and even deaths.
In the US, more than 300 reported cases of road rage yearly have ended with serious injuries or even fatalities. According to a six-year AAA Foundation study that examined police records nationally, there were 1,200 road rage incidents per year.
As early as 1997, therapists in the US have been working to certify road rage as a medical condition. Road rage is already an official mental disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. According to an article published by the Associated Press in 2006, “the behaviors typically associated with road rage are the result of intermittent explosive disorder.” This previously-published conclusion was drawn from surveys of some 9,200 adults in the US between 2001 and 2003 and was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health.
A 2007 study of the largest US metropolitan areas concluded that the cities with the least courteous drivers (most road rage) are Miami, Phoenix, New York, Los Angeles and Boston. In 2009, New York, Dallas/Fort Worth, Detroit, Atlanta and Minneapolis/St. Paul were rated as the top five “Road Rage Capitals” of the United States.
Sadly, there are still no comprehensive road rage statistics in the Philippines. We can only cite some.
On November 18, 2009, 27-year-old Renato Victor Ebarle Jr.’s vehicle had nearly collided with another SUV driven by a foreign-looking man on Santolan Road, Quezon City. The man reportedly blocked Ebarle’s path, stepped out of his blue Honda CRV, with the diplomatic plate number 20903, and shot Ebarle --- the son of an undersecretary for the Office of the Presidential Chief of Staff --- three times at close range through the car's windshield before escaping. The suspect’s SUV was later traced to Stephen Pollard, a British economist at the Asian Development Bank.
Police later identified the alleged killer as American Jason Ivler, 27, son of Pollard’s wife Marlene Aguilar (Freddie Aguilar’s sister) from a previous marriage.
Another motorist, Manolito Cuya, 47, said that the night before Ebarle was killed, Ivler pointed a gun at him in New Manila, Quezon City after he blew his horn at Ivler’s vehicle on Hemady Street in Quezon City, saying: "Masuwerte ka may kasama kang mga bata. Pero pag nakita kita uli, papatayin na kita (You're lucky you have children with you. If I see you again, I'll kill you)." Cuya was with his wife, sister-in-law, daughter, and niece at the time.
Police raided three houses in Quezon City in November but failed to find Ivler. A manhunt was launched for the “armed and dangerous” American, with P1 million offered to anyone who could provide information leading to his arrest. Ivler’s name was also included in the International Police Organization’s ‘red notice’ list, which meant he could be arrested abroad and deported to the Philippines.
On Nov. 27, Ivler’s mother went to the National Bureau of Investigation and claimed that the allegations against her son came about after she wrote a book ‘that denounces America and its killing machine’. Aguilar also said she had no information on the whereabouts of her son, whom she described as ‘a highly trained soldier’ from the US Special Operations command who had been sent to ‘risky’ missions in Iraq. He received an ‘honorable discharge in October 2008.
On December 23, a Quezon City judge issued an arrest warrant, without bail, for Ivler. In the same month, Aguilar told police she had received an e-mail from Ivler saying he was in Hawaii (where he finished AB Psychology at the Hawaii Pacific University) and that her son would not surrender without a fight.
On 18 January 2010, Jason was arrested by agents of the National Bureau of Investigation or NBI in his mother's home in, Quezon City. Two NBI operatives were wounded after Jason instigated a brief shootout. Jason sustained gunshot wounds in his right shoulder and in his abdomen that cut through his spleen and large intestines.
Ivler also figured in a 2004 vehicular accident on the C-5 Ortigas flyover that killed Nestor Ponce, then presidential adviser for resettlement, and injured Ponce’s wife and another passenger. For the 2004 incident, Ivler was charged in a Pasig City court with reckless imprudence resulting in homicide and slight physical injuries. He pleaded guilty to the lighter crime and was sentenced to public censure. He asked the court to quash the more serious charges, claiming double jeopardy, but his motion was denied. Ivler’s petition for review is pending at the Supreme Court.
When he was 22, Jason was charged with homicide due to reckless imprudence when, in August 2004, he reportedly lost control of his Toyota Land Cruiser and crashed to an Isuzu Trooper. This resulted in the death of Nestor Ponce Jr. who was President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s adviser for resettlement. Jason posted bail and allegedly attempted to flee to Malaysia by boat but was arrested in Zamboanga City. He was considered a fugitive after failing to appear in the homicide case hearings that are still pending in a Pasig City court.
Early this year, Bureau of Customs Commissioner Paulino Elevado (and his companion Florencio Bato) mauled a 20-year old student during a traffic altercation along the South Luzon Express Way. Elevado then shot at the student’s vehicle as he drove off in his P5-million Porsche. Security cameras on SLEx caught the incident.
On June 21, 2009, a traffic altercation turned into a deadly family feud, leaving six people dead. The trouble started at a traffic jam on the Nueño Avenue in Imus, Cavite as Sowaib Salie repeatedly honked his vehicle's horns at the car in front driven by Raul Bautista. A confrontation erupted when both motorists arrived at the public market. Bautista then left the scene only to come back later with reinforcement in tow. A brief firefight left six people dead, including Bautista, his two sons and the family driver, and Salie and his fellow trader Mahmod Sultan.
In 1998, Feliber Andres family's All Saints’ Day eve pilgrimage to the Loyola Memorial Park in Marikina took a ghastly turn when their vehicle nearly collided with the one driven by Inocencio Gonzalez. Noel Andres tailed Gonzalez’ vehicle first before he cut his path which resulted in a confrontation between the two motorists. In the heat of the argument, Gonzalez pulled out a gun and shot at the Andres’ vehicle, hitting Andres and his pregnant wife, their two-year old son, and their nephew. Feliber did not survive the attack but the doctors were able to save her baby. The son and the nephew were discharged from the hospital a few days later. Gonzalez was found guilty of murder and two counts of frustrated murder in 1999. The Supreme Court then modified the 2001 trial court's decision, finding him guilty of homicide.
On January 10, 2003, Jay Llamas was traversing the northbound lane of Taft Avenue when his Toyota Corolla was bumped by a motorcycle as they neared the Buendia intersection. Llamas and the unnamed motorcycle driver got into a heated argument which ended when the suspect drew a gun and shot Llamas at close range three times--twice in the head and once in the body. The suspect then hailed a parked tricycle and fled the scene. The case remains unsolved to this date.
On October 2, 2007, Edgardo Canizares was traveling with a passenger along Gen. Roxas Street near the corner of Shaw Boulevard when his Nissan Cefiro almost hit the car of Manuel Hernandez Jr., a Pasig City Hall legal officer and nephew of a Sandiganbayan Justice. Hernandez was reportedly driving against the flow of traffic, prompting an angry Canizares to get out of his car and insult Hernandez. Hernandez pulled out a gun and shot Canizares four times and his passenger, twice. Homicide charges were filed against Hernandez but he was freed after posting an P80,000 bail.*
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