Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte pardoned a U.S. infantryman on Monday in a surprise move that will free the
Marine
from jail time for the 2014 killing of a trans Filipino woman, a decision that
sparked outrage from human rights defenders.
The soldier, Joseph Pemberton, was charged when he was 19 years old with the murder of Jennifer Laude, committed in October 2014 and classified as a hate crime.
Pemberton had an appeal pending of his 10-year prison sentence.
"To do justice, the president has granted an absolute pardon to Pemberton," Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodore Locsin announced on Twitter on Monday, without offering further details.
Duterte later said that he believed Pemberton had been good in prison and that for him as president that was "enough" for forgiveness.
A left-wing human rights group, Karapatan, and Laude's family's lawyer
condemned the pardon as a "despicable and shameless mockery of justice
and servility toward US imperialist interests."
"There are many, many Filipinos behind bars," said the attorney, Virgie Suárez. "Why then forgive a foreigner, an American soldier who committed a heinous crime?"
[A new video sheds light on the death of trans woman Layleen Polanco in a New York prison]
Pemberton's attorney, Rowena Garcia-Flores, told the Associated Press that her client expressed willingness to apologize to the Laude family all these years later.
Transgender Latinas experience triple discrimination in the United States.
April 28, 201902: 28
Duterte's presidential spokesperson is Harry Roque, who was previously an attorney for the Laude family.
He told reporters that "
the president has erased the punishment that should be imposed on Pemberton. What the president did not erase was the conviction of Pemberton. He is still a murderer."
The court order rekindled perceptions that US military personnel in violation of Philippine laws may receive special treatment under the Allied Visiting Forces Agreement, which provides the legal framework for temporary visits by US forces to the country for exercises. large-scale combat.
Duterte had said he wanted to scrap the deal, dubbed VFA for its acronym in English, but reversed his decision in June and the rule remained.
[Chronology of the murder of a transgender woman in Puerto Rico: what is known about the Alexa case]
Pemberton, an anti-tank missile operator from New Bedford, Massachusetts, was one of thousands of U.S. and Filipino servicemen who participated in joint military exercises in the country in 2014.
He and a group of other Marines were on leave after drills and met Laude and his friends at a bar in Olongapo, a town known for its nightlife outside Subic Bay, a former US Navy base. U.S.
Hours later, Laude was found dead with her head inside a toilet in a motel room, where witnesses said she was searched with Pemberton.
According to the sentence, the military man killed Laude when they were about to have sexual relations.
[Two transgender women are murdered in two days. One of them survived a beating that went viral]
With information from AP and EFE