A daily average of 20 murders were reported to the...

A daily average of 20 murders were reported to the Philippine National Police from January to April 2002, as against only 16 cases in the same period in 2001. In a statement, Catanduanes Rep. Joseph Santiago said the 25 percent year-on-year increase in murders belied the claim of advocates that the death penalty served to deter heinous crimes.
According to Santiago, a total of 2,395 murders were reported nationwide in the four months to April 2002, compared with only 1,947 cases listed in the same period last year. Santiago is one of 62 co-authors of a House bill that seeks to abolish capital punishment in favor of a harsher form of life imprisonment.
"We maintain that the certainty that a felon is caught, prosecuted, convicted and punished for his or her crime is far more important in deterring crime than the cruelty of the punishment itself," Santiago said.
"If the current rate of increase continues, we are looking at about 7,185 murders by yearend as against only 5,843 cases in the whole of last year," Santiago added. Annual cases of murder have been on a general decline since 1994, when the death penalty law took effect. Since 1997, annual cases have not exceeded the 6,000-mark.
In 2001, the 5,843 murders reported marked a 2 percent increase over the 5,735 listed in 2000.Murder, when attended by aggravating factors, is a capital offense punishable by death. Of the 1,915 convicts on death row as of end-2001, about one-fourth or 463 were condemned for murder.