Respect the court decision, Malacañang urged the public after the Sandiganbayan junked the last of the plunder cases filed against the immortal Juan Ponce Enrile, his ex-chief of staff Jessica Reyes and pork barrel scam queen Janet Lim Napoles.
The appeal was expected from the Palace, where Enrile, still spry at 101, is the chief legal counsel of the appointing power in the judiciary, President Marcos. How can you be too old and frail for jail without bail, but young and hale enough to continue being on the public payroll, occupying a post right there in the nation’s seat of power?
Being no spring chicken myself, I like Enrile for being a strong argument against ageism. But a key issue in his acquittal by the Sandiganbayan is not the fallacy of ageism, or even the legal soundness of the decision. In a criminal case, guilt must be established beyond reasonable doubt – something that the Sandiganbayan says the prosecution failed to do.
Even in the aspect of civil liability, however, where only a ‘preponderance of evidence’ is needed to convict, the Sandigan spared Enrile and Reyes from the joint payment by Napoles and 15 co-defendants of P338 million.
No, the key issue is that the acquittal, 12 years after the pork barrel scandal erupted, is now feared to be a harbinger of the fate of the expected indictments in connection with the trillion-peso looting of public funds in flood control projects alone.
Such fears have persisted even before Enrile’s acquittal, as witnesses who faced congressional probes could not provide testimony that lawmakers implicated in the scandal were direct recipients of dirty money.
No one signs or even affixes a thumbprint to incriminating documents in this country. (Except Joseph Estrada, who signed incriminating bank documents as ‘Jose Velarde’ in front of witnesses.)
Even those shockingly huge piles of cash that a government bank allowed to be withdrawn need a solid trail leading to the supposed recipients. Witnesses said the suitcases of cash were handed over to the aides of lawmakers.
We know what will happen: the bosses will throw the aides under the bus, and wash their hands of the mess. We saw this in the case of Richard Cambe, a lawyer who landed in the national penitentiary while his boss in the Senate, Bong Revilla, was cleared. Cambe died of a stroke while serving his sentence.
At least Enrile got Reyes acquitted. But she also stayed in detention without bail for nine years, while her boss was freed on bail on humanitarian grounds in 2015.
Authorities must revisit this aspect of our legal system that allows those found guilty by a regional trial court to remain free on bail until final conviction – which could be long after the convict has already croaked.
This system is fine, to protect victims of wrongful prosecution, but only if the period of appeal until final conviction is reasonably short. What’s reasonable? A few months would be reasonable. Over a year is iffy; it could allow the crook to run for public office, and win using plundered funds to buy votes and dispense patronage.
The system favors wealthy convicts, who can afford any amount of bail as well as expensive lawyers who know how to make bail even for plunder possible based on unprecedented humanitarian grounds.
Exhibit A is President Marcos’ mommie dearest herself, Imeldific, out on bail despite being convicted by the Sandiganbayan on seven counts of graft. At the tender age of 96, Imeldific is still partying at Malacañang.
We should keep track of the career trajectories of the Sandigan justices who convicted Imeldific, comparing them with those who dismissed all the Marcos ill-gotten wealth cases mostly during the BBM administration due to ‘inordinate delay.’ Toss in the justices of the Third Division who acquitted Enrile and Reyes.
Following the acquittal of the lucky pair, dismayed folks are warning about a similar fate for the cases now being prepared in connection with the infrastructure anomalies.
There’s the curious case of Elizaldy Co. His passport can’t be canceled and there’s no Interpol red notice for him because there is still no court-issued warrant for his arrest, according to Department of Justice spokesman Polo Martinez. So far, no case has been filed against Co before any court.
There isn’t even any preliminary investigation yet prior to court indictment, because this requires jurisdiction over Co – which is not possible while he is abroad, Martinez told ‘Storycon’ on One News last week.
The cases of Alice Guo, charged with human trafficking, and extradited murder suspect Arnolfo Teves are different, Martinez said.
Those promised arrest warrants, and anticipated overcrowding at the Quezon City jail, could one day end up in a flood of acquittals, or at least bail on humanitarian grounds.
These would be issued when people are no longer looking – like that ‘secret’ reversal of ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales’ order for the dismissal of Joel Villanueva for the misuse of his pork barrel when he was a CIBAC party-list congressman.
Morales’ successor Samuel Martires, who issued the reversal two years after the dismissal order, explained that it was not done in secret, but followed normal procedure, and that it is not part of the functions of the ombudsman to announce every decision.
He said he did not inform Morales about the reversal because she is not a party to the case.
The job of the ombudsman, Martires explained, is to determine probable cause for filing a case in court against a suspected offender. The court determines if the evidence establishes guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
‘That’s why I’m not speaking – not because I’m protecting these people,’ Martires said in an interview. ‘I’m not speaking because I don’t have the right to destroy their future.’
But the case of Villanueva did not reach the courts. He was dismissed at the ombudsman’s level as part of the disciplinary powers of the office. Martires wielded that power when he ordered the dismissal of Alice Guo last year as mayor of Bamban, Tarlac. No need for a court trial.
Shouldn’t a case involving a congressman-turned-senator warrant special mention by the ombudsman? And how can speaking about clearing a senator violate his dignity or destroy his future?
Seeing all the thieves going unpunished and even flaunting their ill-gotten wealth made corruption endemic in our country.
In the trillion-peso flood control scandal, the prospect of the thieves again getting away is the spookiest thought in this season of ghosts.