On Aug.

23, Rolando Mendoza, a former senior police inspector with the Manila police
department, boarded a tourist bus in downtown Manila and took control of the vehicle, holding
the 25 occupants (tourists from Hong Kong and their Philippine guides) hostage.

HOSTAGE TIMELINE

Here is the chronological list of events that unfolded during the hostage crisis at the Quirino
grandstand.

•10:15 a.m. –Dismissed Senior Inspector Rolando Mendoza boards tourist bus at Intramuros.

•12:15 p.m. – Mendoza released the first batch of hostages which included three Chinese
children.

•3:00 p.m. – Mendoza sets deadline for demands.

•6:00 p.m. – Mendoza receives letter from the Office of the Ombudsman saying they will review
his case.

•7:10 p.m. – Police arrest Mendoza’s brother, SPO4 Gregorio Mendoza. Mendoza watching the
footage tells an RMN anchor over the phone that he will start firing at the tourists if his brother is
arrested. This is the last time Mendoza is heard on the air.

•7:21 p.m. - First two shots followed by succeeding fire are heard from the bus. Snipers tires to
immobilize the vehicle.

•7:30 p.m. - Bus driver escapes through the driver side window, going straight to the mobile
command and shouting that all the hostages had been killed.

•7:37 p.m. - Members of a SWAT team start to surround the bus. They breakdown the windows
and doors by using sledgehammers.

•7:40 p.m. - More gunshots. Police advance towards bus.

•7:45 p.m. - Policemen fasten a rope around the glass door to force it open.

•7:51 p.m. - Police lob tear gas inside the bus through the broken windows.

•8:04 p.m. – more shots heard but uncertain if it came from inside the bus.

•8:10 p.m. - Police pull rope but snapped.

•8:40 p.m. –More shots fired but still unclear if it came from outside or inside the bus.

•8:45 p.m.. Police begin to approach the bus. Reports say that a sniper says he has shot and killed
the hostage-taker.
•Around 9:00 p.m. Police open the rear emergency exit. Police hesitate at first in entering the bus
but eventually force their way in. Several hostages walk out, while others are carried on
stretchers and brought to waiting ambulances.

•12:30 a.m. President Aquino gives a press conference about the hostage crisis.

August 23, 2010 at Quirino Grandstand, Manila Philippines after an ex- Police senior inspector
Rolando Mendoza, took 25 people hostage aboard a bus including 22 Hong Kong tourist, a
Filipino driver, a Filipino tour guide and Tse, the tour’s Hong Kong tour guide. The bus operated
by Hong Thai Travel Services was then taking its Hong Kong based tourist passengers in front of
Quirino Grandstand in Rizal Park at around 10 AM . Mendoza followed the tourists onto the
coach requesting a free ride. When his request was declined by the driver, Mendoza brandished a
weapon, handcuffed the driver and hijacked the bus. The mad ex-police was carrying a M16
rifle.

Mendoza took people held as hostages to demand that his case be reinstated with benefits to his
previous post at the Manila Police District from which he had been dismissed from for extortion
in 2009 claiming that he was only framed. Rolando Mendoza was said to be a police with honor
and has decorated 17 times for bravery . He was also one of the Ten Outstanding Policemen of
the Philippines by Jaycees International. Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim said he would grant
Mendoza’s wish if he could prove himself.

The Office of the Ombudsman disallowed Mendoza’s request to be reinstated in the police,
although they assured him that his case would be reviewed. Manila vice mayor Isko Moreno
delivered the letter from the Ombudsman to the hostage scene.

According to the police, Mendoza had been discharged from the department after being charged
with extortion. Mendoza claimed the charges were fabricated and had fought a protracted
administrative and legal battle in his effort to be reinstated.

Hostage Situations

By the time of the rescue attempt, the saga of Mendoza's firing from the police force had been
going on for some time, and it is important to recognize that he did not make a spontaneous
decision to seize the tourist bus. Even if the bus was targeted shortly before the attack,
Mendoza's path toward violent action would have included several significant warning signs. As
in almost any case of violence that stems from issues in the workplace, once the chain of events
are examined more closely, reports will emerge that warning signs were either missed or ignored.
Had those warning signs been noted and acted upon, this situation might have been avoided.

Since the event was not pre-empted, once it happened and developed into a hostage situation, the
primary objective of the authorities was to resolve the incident without violence. Skillful hostage
negotiators do this by allowing the hostage-taker to vent. They also work hard to defuse any
tension that has the attacker on edge and to gently wear the attacker down to the point of
surrender. One of the essential principles in this effort is to isolate the hostage-taker so that he or
she cannot receive outside communication, motivation, encouragement or other forms of support.
Hostage negotiators seek to control the flow of all information into or out of the crime scene.
That did not occur in this case. Mendoza was able to talk to outsiders on his cell phone and even
gave media interviews. He was also able to use the television in the bus to watch live media
coverage of the incident, including video of the deployment of police officers. This gave him a
considerable advantage and far more information than what he could have observed with his eyes
from inside the curtained bu Meanwhile, as the assault plan is being tweaked, negotiations
continue and the hostage negotiators work to wear down the hostage-taker. It appears that the
negotiators in the Mendoza case were doing a fairly good job of keeping the situation calm until
the situation flared up involving Mendoza's brother and the letter from the ombudsman's office.
Authorities clearly erred by not sending him a letter saying they had dropped the case against
him. (They did not need the extortion charges now that they could arrest him and charge him
with kidnapping and a host of other crimes.) It is hard to understand why the police department
quibbled over words and refused to give him the piece of paper he expressly demanded. The
police then aggravated the situation greatly with the public arrest of Mendoza's brother. Those
two events caused the situation to deteriorate rapidly and resulted in Mendoza's decision to begin
shooting. Once he shot the first two hostages, the negotiations were clearly over and it was time
to implement a tactical solution to the problem.

There is little time for hesitation or error: Lives hang in the balance. This is where things began
to get very ugly in the Mendoza case. Not only was there a delay between the murder of the first
hostages and the launching of the first assault attempt, the assault was not hard, fast or accurate.

MOTIVATION:

Mendoza’s frustration over this process led to his plan to take the hostages. The fact that
Mendoza entertained hope of regaining his police job by breaking the law and taking hostages
speaks volumes about his mental state at the time of the incident.