Cebu’s widely known ‘Desaparecido’ was Fr. Rudy Romano, a Redemptorist priest whose unsolved abduction would be 40 years old in July 2025.
True crime in the news
BORN IN MANILA Sept. 26, 1940, Rosaleo “Rudy” Boller Romano, disappeared after he was grabbed by armed persons on July 11, 1985 “in broad daylight” in Labangon, Cebu City, with some street bystanders watching. [Photos from Facebook]
Cebu’s widely known ‘Desaparecido’ was Fr. Rudy Romano, a Redemptorist priest whose unsolved abduction would be 40 years old in July 2025.
Aug. 30, 2024
Local news media covered it, with one journalist, Lilette Chan-Santos, later producing a book about the true crime.
IN a July 9, 2010 article in SunStar Cebu by Lorenzo P. Niñal — archived with no by-line and credited only to “Sunnex Desk” and with an “LPN” tagline — the disappearance of Fr. Rudy Romano was remembered.
The title “After 25 years, Romano mystery remains” told the reader the abduction of the Redemptorist priest two decades and a half earlier, on July 11, 1985, in Tisa, Labangon, Cebu City was still unsolved, the culprit not even identified, less arrested and prosecuted. It has continued to be whodunit almost 40 years after the crime, with the body not recovered.
What were only known, then and now: seven to 10 armed men in plainclothes, in a white car and on two motorcycles, grabbed Fr. Romano who was himself riding a motorcycle, coming from Cabarrubias St. to Katipunan St. The abductors shoved the priest into their car and fled. Bystanders were watching, stunned by the violence on the “man of God” and the suddenness and quickness of it all.
In 2005, the Redemptorist community, in an official statement, accepted that Fr. Romano could no longer return and would never be with them again. But the search for “justice and truth for Fr. Rudy must never end,” they said.
Actually the search must have stopped a long time ago. It has been long, long way past that point when police consider an unsolved crime not just cold but stone-dead.
There were speculations on who, where and how Fr. Rudy was executed. What the public was sure about was the reason: “He championed the rights of the poor in Cebu in the eighties, a leading figure in the fight against the Marcos dictatorship, organizing rallies, mobilizing communities and attacking human rights abuses in his homilies and speeches.”
Those must have been speeches that struck at and wounded the Government, not of the current “Fr. Ciano” variety, which jokes about violence on women, priests’ liaison with nuns, and churchgoers skimping on cash given by churchgoers during mass.
The article ended with no light shed on the mystery and no hope for Fr. Rudy — and “thousands of other desaparecidos in the country.” Two months before his disappearance, he told his father, “you will know who has killed me, a Sept. 25, 2022 story in Rappler said. [Rappler “Now You Know” feature below.] If his dad knew, the knowledge didn’t lead to the identification and arrest of his abductors and presumed killers.
Yet the SunStar article by Insoy Niñal — a former seminarian and current local rock star, quoting Redemptorist priest Ricky Acero — said the Romano disappearance “continues to inspire seminarians and other people aspiring to champion the causes of the poor.” — Pachico A. Seares 
LILETTE SANTOS-CHAN’S BOOK. Romano of the Philippines: the Life and Times of a Filipino Priest Desaparecido Who Was Abducted in Cebu in 1985 (published in 1995 by Claretian Publications in coordination with the Redemptorist Vice, Province of Cebu). A soft-cover edition (right) was distributed by Abe Books. Santos Chan, then with SunStar Cebu, reported the story for the paper.
1. 2010 tribute: After 25 years, Romano mystery remains
LORENZO NIÑAL
First published in SunStar, from July 9, 2010 column. Adapted to CJJ Aug. 30, 2024
JULY 11, 1985 was too long ago for residents in Tisa, Labangon, Cebu City, where Redemptorist priest Rudy Romano was abducted, to remember the event. It’s been 25 years; either they were too young then or too busy now to care, they said.
A three-foot-high concrete slab marking the abduction site along Katipunan St. looks neglected, partly hidden from view by dirt, clay pots and ornamental plants.
Marker at crime scene
The marker reads: “Here marks the place where Fr. Rudy Romano, a Redemptorist father and human rights fighter, was abducted by armed men of the deposed Marcos regime on July 11, 1985.
Installed by the new city government of Cebu on July 11, 1986.”
WHERE HE WAS SNATCHED. A marker — erected by the Cebu City Government one year to the day after Fr. Rudy Romano was snatched on July 11, 1985 — tells the public the spot where the crime happened in Katipunan St., Cebu City. [Photo: Project Gunita]
The day the marker was installed, a crowd of 6,000 gathered to watch the reenactment of the priest’s abduction. Now, if not for one or two melted candles on the marker, there would have been no sign that somebody remembered recently.
Occasionally, somebody stops by the marker, says a short prayer and drives on, some residents said. But most of the time, the place is where jeepneys stop to pick up passengers.
Like it is today, Katipunan St. in 1985 was one of the major thoroughfares in Cebu City. But on July 11, 1985, a Thursday, there were no other vehicles in the area except a white Ford Cortina with a government license plate and two motorcycles parked along the road. Each motorcycle had armed men on board.
In the area were seven to 10 armed men in plainclothes, wrote Lilette Chan-Santos in her book “Romano of the Philippines – The Life and Times of a Filipino Redemptorist Desaparecido who was abducted in 1985 in Cebu City.”
“Shortly after 3:30 p.m., a man on a blue motorcycle was seen approaching Cabarrubias St. from Katipunan Road when the white car swung and blocked its path. Men on the two other motorcycles blocked the motorcyclist’s path from behind, leaving no room for maneuver,” Santos wrote.
The men pointed their Armalite rifles at the motorcyclist, shoved him inside the car, and the convoy fled towards the city proper, leaving behind a crowd of stunned bystanders.
Witnesses’ description of the man left no doubt among the Redemptorist community in Cebu that it was Fr. Romano who was abducted.
Closure
Fr. Romano championed the rights of the poor in Cebu in the 80s. He was a leading figure in the fight against the Marcos dictatorship, organizing rallies, mobilizing communities and attacking human rights abuses in his homilies and speeches.
His case unsolved and whereabouts unknown, Romano is one of the hundreds of desaparecidos in the country.
Five years ago, the Redemptorist community in Cebu issued a statement officially accepting the fact that the activist priest will never be with them again. After so many years of pursuing the case at the national and international level, there had to be “closure” for the Redemptorist community to move on in their work among the poor.
“But it doesn’t mean an end to our search for justice and truth for Fr. Rudy,” Redemptorist Parish priest Ricky Acero said.
“With the new Aquino administration, there’s fresh hope justice will be served and truth will finally come out.”
Acero said all masses at the Redemptorist Church tomorrow will be dedicated to Fr. Romano. The Redemptorist community in Cebu and the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines will also mount an exhibit on Romano and all other desaparecidos inside the Redemptorist Church.
“It’s the same problem. People continue to disappear. If it happened to Fr. Rudy, it can happen to anybody,” he said.
Twenty-five years after Romano’s disappearance, the activist priest continues to inspire seminarians and other people aspiring to champion the causes of the poor, Acero said.
At the site of Romano’s abduction, right above the marker, a signpost welcomes visitors to a subdivision and a church named after San Jose and San Lorenzo Ruiz, two saints beloved by Filipinos. As far as signs go, it’s not a bad company for a martyred priest.
2. Fr. Rudy was seen taken to a military camp — and disappeared.
ANOL MONGAYA
First published in SunStar, from Sept. 25, 2016 column. Adapted to CJJ Aug. 30, 2024
FR. ROSALEO “Rudy” Romano would have been celebrating his 76th birthday with us today. But he sacrificed himself in 1985 during the struggle to end the Marcos dictatorship. We now remember him a martyr and our hero.
This afternoon, there will be a mass in his honor at 5:30 p.m. at the Redemptorist Church. Candles will then be lighted at the symbolic tombstone outside the church in our hero’s honor.
The dictator’s family and loyalists cannot move on without burying Da Apo as a hero, though history tells us he was no hero–he faked his war exploits and medals then died a disgraced president. Fr. Rudy, on the other hand, is simply remembered by a small tombstone, that marker in Barangay Tisa, Cebu City, and in our hearts.
In her book “Romano of the Philippines,” my former Philippine News and Features (PNF) and Sun.Star Cebu editor Lilette Chan-Santos wrote: “Born in Manila Sept. 26, 1940, Rudy was barely a toddler when war with Japan broke out. His mother fled from the capital and brought him to Villareal by boat–a trip that took all of one week in those days.
His parents and close relatives remembered him as “the perfect eldest child to Gaudencio and Adelaida. He was a good example to the younger siblings, all of whom looked up to him.”
On July 11, 1985, heavily armed minions of the Marcos dictatorship waited for him since morning at a corner of Cabarrubias St. and Katipunan Road in Barangay Tisa. They accosted and abducted Fr. Romano when he passed by on board his motorcycle at 3 p.m.
We now know he was brought to Camp Lapu-Lapu first. But the Marcos dictatorship never freed him. Fr. Romano became a “desaparecido,” one of the dictator’s countless victims.
Today, we remember Fr. Rudy Romano as among our martyrs and heroes in the struggle to end tyranny and realize freedom and democracy. The dictator, on the other hand, was the villain. Marcos was never a hero.
3. 2022 Rappler feature: Clergyman’s message to his father
NOW YOU KNOW PH
First published in Rappler, Sept. 25, 2022
Fr. Rudy Romano, a Redemptorist priest, was abducted by armed men in barangay Tisa, Cebu City during Martial Law. He was never seen again.
The clergyman identified himself with the poor and joined protest actions denouncing human rights abuses under Marcos’ dictatorship. Two months before his disappearance, his father asked, “I’ve heard a lot of rumors about your activities in Cebu. Why not concentrate solely on your work in the ministry as a priest?”
“Dad, you have already given me to God and I think there is no turning back. If I follow your advice I will not be a worthy priest anymore, because I cannot bear to see these people, the poor of Cebu, especially the squatters, the poor laborers, who are crying to high heaven for help but they have nowhere to go; the government could not help them,” Fr. Rudy replied.
“They go to the priest, they go to the church, they come to me. I am their voice. I am fighting in their behalf. Don’t worry, dad. If I die, I have no family, and you will know who has killed me.”