“It has been said, ‘Time heals all wounds.’ I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.”—Rose Kennedy
Embassy to Pursue Case of Filipina.
KUWAIT CITY – The Philippine Embassy is bent on helping the Filipina who was allegedly raped and stabbed several times by a lance corporal at the General Traffic Department on the early morning of Oct 1 and was left half dead somewhere in South Surra, disclosed on Sunday Head of the Assistance to the Nationals Unit at the Philippine Embassy Dalidig Ibrahim Tanandato.
Tanandato told the Arab Times that the embassy had already consulted Kuwaiti lawyers to legally assist the victim in filing cases of rape and murder against her assailant.
“We will leave no stone unturned so that justice will be served against the suspect,” stressed Tanandato who visited the victim at the Mubarak Al Kabeer Hospital on Sunday where she is now recuperating in the female ward. She was earlier admitted to the Intensive Care Unit after suffering from multiple stab wounds on her neck and some parts of her body. Tanandato accompanied by embassy case officers Muamar Ali Hassan and Muamar Balindong Mamosion has visited the victim four times in the hospital since she was admitted on Oct 1.
Marissa, 27, a native of T’Boli, South Cotabato in Southern Philippines can barely move from her bed as she cries of back pain while her wounds on her neck have started to heal. She was deployed to Kuwait on Sept 12, 2006 to work as a Household Service Worker for three years and later on at a dress shop in Farwaniya. “I came here to work for my son and family,” said Marissa, a single mother.
She disclosed to the Arab Times that the authorities brought the suspect to the hospital on Sunday for positive identification. “I’m still in trauma and I just looked at him while he was in handcuffs. I told the police who were with him that I can never forget his face. He was the one who raped me and stabbed me as I begged for my life,” sobbed Marissa. She added that the suspect even managed to smile at her, giving her a chill in her spine.
She recounted that on the late evening of Sept 30, she and her female friend came out from a mall along the Sixth Ring Road. They were inside a cab on their way home to Farwaniya when they were stopped by the suspect who alighted from the police car. Unfortunately, her residence visa had just expired four days earlier and it was still being renewed by her new sponsor. The suspect let her friend get away as she still has a valid visa while she was taken by the suspect to the police car.
“He told me that he will take me to the police station in South Surra but I was surprised when he stopped in a dark and deserted place,” she recounted. She added that the suspect forced her to perform oral sex and raped her from behind and front. “After raping me, I begged him to stop and I was terrified when he reached for a small knife that looked like a Swiss knife and stabbed me on my neck several times then kicked me hard on my back. I lost consciousness and when I woke up I was already here at the hospital,” she cried.
Marissa said that she is grateful that she survived the ordeal and vowed to fight for justice. She revealed to the Arab Times that one of the female relatives of the suspect visited her on Saturday at the hospital and allegedly offered her some money. “Imagine this lady, I don’t how is she related with the suspect, visited me here at the hospital and offered me KD 100 and said that she will fix my visa and find me a job on a condition that I drop the case. But I told her no way. I almost lost my life and I will fight for my case so that the rapist who did this to me will suffer all the pain that I’ve been through. I want him behind bars,” she cried.
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