Transgender woman found hacked to death in Pangasinan resort

Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 18) — A transgender woman was found with a deep and fatal hack in her neck and eye, in a resort in Bolinao, Pangasinan on Tuesday.

Jessa Remiendo was found lifeless in her own blood and covered in white sand along the shores of Patar beach in Bolinao. She was only in her underwear and a red kimono-like top.

Bolinao Municipal Police said the transgender woman sustained a "hack wound" on her neck and right eye. Police said the motive for the killing has yet to be determined.

The United Pangasinan Association of LGBTQIA+ Inc. said Remeindo went to drink with her fellow resort workers at Valdevia Resort on Monday night. She excused herself to buy cigarettes, but never returned to her friends. She was found dead the next morning.

The Commission on Human Rights condemned the attack.

"Nobody deserves to have their lives to be curtailed at a whim, let alone that the victim is part of the LGBTQIA+ community, a vulnerable sector of our society," CHR spokesperson Jacqueline Ann de Guia said.

An official of the local transcommunity, Noreen Barber, reiterated the need for the passage of the Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE) Equality Bill to protect members of the queer community from violence, harassment, and discrimination.

"Para sa mga ANTI-SOGIE BILL, ilan pa ba ang magbubuwis ng buhay para patunayan na napapanahon nang ipasa ang batas na ito? Ilang Jessa pa ang dadanak ang dugo para lang sa isang kautusang magbibigay proteksyon sa mga katulad natin?" she wrote on her Facebook page.

[Translation: To those against the passage of the SOGIE bill, how many more have to be killed to probe that we need this law? How many Jessas need to die to pass a law that will protect people like us?]

The bill shielding LGBTQ+ people from discrimination has been languishing in Congress for almost a decade. The SOGIE Equality Bill was passed by the House of Representatives in the previous Congress, but was blocked from passing in the Senate by senators who repeatedly insisted to interpellate the proposed law. Several lawmakers have refiled the measure in both chambers of Congress. Pending the passage of a national law banning discrimination on the basis of SOGIE, LGBTQ+ advocates are instead banking on local ordinances for their protection.