The Maggie de la Riva story
(Posted almost 2 years ago under General History visited 20,459 times)
On June 26, 1967, the young and beautiful actress, Maggie De La Riva was abducted and raped by four men. These men were Jaime Jose, Basilio "Boy" Pineda Jr., Eduardo Aquino and Rogelio Canial.
Magdalena "Maggie" De La Riva was born in September 3, 1942 and graduated high school at Maryknoll College (now Miriam college) in 1958. She obtained a secretarial degree in 1960 at Saint Theresa's college. She became a finalist at the 1962 Miss Caltex beauty contest. Maggie first appeared as a background extra in the 1963 TV show, "The Big Show" where she was serenaded by Ruben Tagalog. She later became the lead actress in the stage play "Cat on a Tin Roof in 1964 and also had a radio program at DZRC Manila called "Pakikipagtipan Kay Maggie Dela Riva". In 1964, she became Miss Lucky Centavo.
In 1964, Maggie's father, Juan De La Riva, died at age 58. This made Maggie the breadwinner of the family. Her mother, Pilar Torrente De La Riva, managed their house and supported the needs of her daughter.
Maggie Dela Riva was then doing very well in her career as a movie actress. She was being paid P8,000 Philippine pesos per movie, P800 per month on permanent radio and television performances, P300 per month on live promotional shows and P100 to P200 per guest appearance on other shows. During the 1960's, these amounts were considered quite hefty and so Miss Dela Riva was earning quite well.
Eduardo Aquino was the son of a lawyer-accountant from Calaca, Batangas and was a second year journalism student. He resided at 172 Mayon street in Quezon city.
Rogelio Canial was the son of a retired school principal, a native of Bacolod city and resided at Palanan street, Santa Mesa, Manila.
Jaime Jose was the son of physician from Guagua, Pampanga. He was a combo player and resided at 21 Kalatagan, Makati, Rizal.
Basilio Pineda was a son of a former Pasay City police chief. Basilio has two children and resided at Makati, Rizal.
According to the statement given by Jaime Jose to the police, Boy Pineda, Eddie Aquino and Rogelio Canial went to his house in Makati to borrow his red Pontiac convertible car at around 11am on June 25, 1967. Jaime did not want to lend his car without him being in the group and so he decided to tag along.
The group went to Ulog Cocktail lounge located along A. Mabini street in Ermita where they had several rounds of drinks until 3:30am the following day. While they were drinking, Pineda shared to the group that he was in love with the movie actress, Maggie De La Riva. According to Jose, Pineda knew that Miss De La Riva has a video taping session that morning at ABS Studio.
From Ulog, the group went to ABS studio located at Roxas boulevard in Pasay City where Pineda and Rogelio tried to talk to Miss De La Riva. Not knowing the group of men, Miss De La Riva ignored them and drove off in her car along with her maid, Elena Calderon. The four men decided to follow Miss De La Riva's car which was heading to her house located at no. 48 12th street in New Manila. The time then was around 4:30am. Miss De La Riva was about to reach her house when the car being driven by the four men drove next to her car and tried to bump it. She stepped on her brakes and swerved to avoid collision. When Miss De La Riva stopped her car, she was already in front of the gate of her house. Being annoyed, she shouted, "Ano ba?!"
Pineda jumped out of their car, opened the door of Maggie's car and pulled her left arm. Maggie tried to held on to the steering wheel but Pineda was able to pull her out of her car. The maid went out of the car and grabbed Maggie's right arm and tried to pull her off from Pineda. The three other men inside the Pontiac assisted Pineda in getting Maggie inside the Pontiac and they sped off towards Broadway Street. The maid was left behind.
Pineda and his group took Maggie to Swanky Hotel in Pasay City and committed the atrocious crime of rape. The four men then drove in front of the Free Press building not far from EDSA near channel 5. They wanted to make it appear that Maggie just came from the studio. They also decided to flag down a taxi from a less known company called UBL Taxicab so that they could load Maggie in it. The driver of the cab that the men flagged down was Miguel F. Campos. When Maggie finally got inside the cab, she broke down and kept on asking the driver if there is a car following them. The driver told her that there was none. At 6:30am that day, the cab reach Maggie's residence and several PC, police officers and reporters were there.
On June 29, 1967, Miss De La Riva, along with her lawyer, Regina O. Benitez and members of her family, went to Quezon City police headquarters and filed a complain.
At around 2pm that day, Jose was spotted walking along Buendia avenue while reading a Daily Mirror newspaper that had the headline about the rape of Miss De La Riva. Jose was nabbed by detectives Pablo Pascual and Ricardo Aniceto who were disguised as ice cream vendors. Jose tried to escape by running away but another detective named Reynaldo Roldan, who was armed with a Thompson submachinegun, blocked Jose's escape.
While Maggie was at the police headquarters, she heard about Jaime Jose's arrest. That evening, Maggie returned to the police headquarters. When Jose saw Maggie, he stood up and said, "Maggie, Maggie, please…..Hindi ako kasama. Magsabi ka nang tutuo" (I am not one of them. Tell the truth). Maggie just stonily stared at Jose, sat down and cried. After a while, Maggie stood up and tried to scratch Jose's face but failed. She then said, "You, you were one of the boys that pulled my legs and raped me!" Jose's face went pale. He turned to the wall and cried.
After learning that Jose had been arrested, Aquino, Pineda and Canial became frantic and met together somewhere in Pasay city. They drove Jose's Mercedez Benz to San Miguel, Bulacan to loose any law enforcement that were tracking them down. From Bulacan, the three men drove back to Manila, passing through Pasay City and then drove to Batangas. They checked-in at the Samson Ponti rest house in Lipa city using fictitious names. When the men had their supper at a restaurant in Lipa City, they were recognized by a waitress who had read about the De La Riva case in the newspaper. The waitress notified the local police. The following day, the three men transferred to another house owned by a Manila City official located in Katipunan street in Lipa city. A team of law enforcement officers lead by Detective Restituto Vinas joined up with members of the Lipa Police department and surrounded the house where the fugitives were hiding. The combined police force slipped into the backyard of the house and entered through the kitchen door. They arrested Canial and Pineda in the living room.
Aquino was able to escape by driving their Mercedez Benz to barrio Santa Rita in Taal. Law Enforcement tried to track down Aquino in Taal but was not able to locate him. Aquino later surrendered to Mrs. Aurelia Leviste, the wife of the governor of Batangas.
The four men were sent to Muntinlupa National Penitentiary while their appeals were being heard.
In December 28, 1970, Rogelio Canial died from overdose of drugs while still in prison. On February 6, 1971, the supreme court found the remaining three men guilty and sentenced to death by electric chair.
Jaime Jose was electrocuted on the chair, as his father watched in somber regret. After a scuffle and forcible drag into the chamber, Basilio Pineda met the same end. Unlike the others, Eduardo Aquino came with much more acceptance.
Source:
- The galant stand of a woman against crime, February 24, 2011, https://adenu1980.blogspot.com/
- With the Death of Her Rapists, Maggie Found Justice, Ben Kageyama, Februry 24, 2021, https://medium.com/
- Maggie de la Riva rape case, Wikipedia