A Mandaluyong court has issued an arrest warrant for former Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office general manager Royina Garma and four others over the 2020 murder of PCSO board secretary Wesley Barayuga.
In a warrant dated Sept. 13, Regional Trial Court Branch 279 ordered the arrest of Garma, former National Police Commission commissioner Edilberto Leonardo and police officials Jeremy Causapin, Santie Mendoza and Nelson Mariano.
The suspects are facing murder and frustrated murder charges.
Barayuga was gunned down inside his car by a motorcycle-riding assailant in Mandaluyong on July 30, 2020.
His driver survived the attack.
Of the three police officers implicated, one has been dismissed from service, one is under the Personnel Holding and Accounting Unit and the other has resigned, according to the Philippine National Police.
The PNP is coordinating with the Bureau of Immigration to verify reports that some of the accused may have left the country, PNP public information office chief Brig. Gen. Randulf Tuano said yesterday.
Garma’s ICC testimony
Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said the arrest warrant for Garma will not affect her testimony against detained former president Rodrigo Duterte before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
‘If she’s abroad now, then she wouldn’t be returning. She’ll go straight to The Hague,’ he said.
Garma earlier flew to Malaysia to meet with ICC representatives to prepare for her testimony in Duterte’s crimes against humanity case.
Remulla said the government is providing some protection to Garma by allowing her to meet with the ICC in Malaysia, noting that her life could be in danger in the Philippines.
Negotiations between Garma, former senator Antonio Trillanes and the ICC had been ongoing while she was in the United States and the DOJ was made aware of its developments, Remulla said.
Garma, a retired police colonel, had blown the whistle on a reward system in Duterte’s bloody drug war.