Senate panel detains employer of maltreated maid

UPON a motion filed by Sen. Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada, the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights, headed by Sen. Francis “Tol” Tolentino, on Tuesday cited in contempt, the employer who allegedly subjected a housemaid to severe battery and maltreatment, causing her blindness and other injuries.

PHOTO BY RENE H. DILAN

The committee has also ordered the detention of France Garcia-Ruiz, at the Senate premises.

Estrada had initially moved that Ruiz be detained at the Pasay City Jail, but the committee decided that she be detained at the Senate's holding room so she could easily be accessed when the investigation resumes next week. She is also allowed to receive family visitors.

Estrada said the contempt and detention order were issued against Ruiz “for continuously evading the questions propounded by the members of this committee, as well as falsely testifying under direct examination by committee members and consistent with the rules of the Senate.”

Senators were irked after Ruiz repeatedly denied that she maltreated Elvira Vergara despite testimonies by medical experts and Vergara's co-workers against the employer.

Estrada did not include Pablo Ruiz, husband of France, in the order as the committee saw him as less guilty of the maltreatment charges.

During the hearing, the Ruiz couple denied allegations that they had assaulted Vergara, causing major physical injuries like loss of teeth and blindness in one eye.

The 44-year-old household helper said she was also hanged in a meat hook by her former employer's butcher.

She said that her employer France Ruiz allegedly ordered the male butcher to deal with her.

The butcher, identified as a certain “Ogie,” then hanged Vergara in the kitchen using the meat hook, with Ruiz witnessing her maid's ordeal that lasted for around three minutes.