San Nicolas: Romero’s voice was heard by everybody

“The voice of Emie Romero was heard not just by the jurors but by everybody in this community,” said Attorney General Joey P. San Nicolas, referring to murdered bartender Emerita Romero’s chilling 911 call where she was heard screaming and begging for her life at the hands of her killer, Joseph A. Crisostomo.
To put it in perspective, San Nicolas said that Romero’s case went through three Department of Public Safety commissioners, two attorneys general, two governors, three chief prosecutors, and so many people involved in the investigation and eventual prosecution of Crisostomo.

“It just goes to show that through a joint collaborative effort of all our law enforcement agencies and offices, we can come together and help justice to be served and to allow the victim’s voice to be heard,” he said Friday.

Meantime, Romero’s siblings, Estelita and Eduardo Relata, wrote a letter over the weekend on behalf of their family to thank everyone “who in one way or another worked zealously to bring justice.”

“My sister Emie’s murder caused great suffering for us and your efforts and service gave us hope and healing,” Estelita Relata said.

A Superior Court jury on Thursday unanimously found the 40-year-old Crisostomo guilty of kidnapping, raping, killing, and robbing Romero, a mother of two.

Associate Judge Joseph N. Camacho, who presided over the trial and decided the misdemeanor charges, found him guilty of assault and battery and disturbing the peace.

Crisostomo will be sentenced on May 28, 2014.

San Nicolas thanked the Romero family, her siblings, Romero’s two children, and everybody related to Romero “for their patience, their strength, for the courage, and inspiration.”

“They inspired all of us in law enforcement to do what we did. So I give all the credit, the praise to the families of Emie Romero. And I ask everybody to keep her memory, keep her in their prayers,” he said.

San Nicolas also thanked Camacho for “being very fair and firm” and the jurors for considering all the evidence and coming out with a just verdict.

“We believe justice was served,” he said.

“I do want to say that I very much appreciate the help of special agent Haejun Park from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and our brothers and sisters at the FBI,” he said, disclosing that the FBI shouldered much of the expenses in obtaining and testing pieces of evidence.

San Nicolas also thanked all the OAG staff, law enforcement and the Philippine Consulate and “all in one way or another help them prepare for the trial.”

“This was for us, a little over two years of work. But for the victim’s family, family of Ms. Romero, this has been a trying process for them. The credit goes to her brother, her sister, the family members who day in and out always kept us reminded of the significance of this case and how we should always be vigilant in upholding…we’re talking about the rule of law, this is exactly it, upholding the rule of law,” he said.

Romero, a bartender at Godfather’s Bar, was last seen boarding a car near her house in Garapan in the early morning of Feb. 5, 2012. Two days later, FBI special agents Park and Joseph Auther found her body in a small room at an abandoned La Fiesta Mall in San Roque/As Matuis. Autopsy showed she was beaten up and strangled to death with a pair of leggings.