Senator Antonio Trillanes on Thursday said President Rodrigo Duterte had a hand in the downgrade of the murder charges against Supt. Marvin Marcos and the other suspect cops in the slay of former Albuera, Leyte Mayor Roland Espinosa.
However, President Duterte himself shielded Marcos from culpability and defended him when he was dismissed by National Police chief General Ronald dela Rosa.
“Malalim itong kasong ito ah, ultimately, sabi ko nga under different circumstances, malalaman natin na itong si President Duterte mismo ang nag-utos sa mga ito o nagbigay ng go signal sa grupo nila Supt. Marcos na ipapatay si Mayor Espinosa,” Trillanes said.
[Translation: This case is deep, ultimately, as I said, under different circumstances, we will see that President Duterte either gave instructions or gave the go signal to the cops to kill Mayor Espinosa.]
The suspected cops have pled not guilty to the crime on Tuesday, and the 19 policemen are out on bail after posting bail of P40,000 each.
This follows the resolution dated June 2 signed by Department of Justice (DOJ) Undersecretary Reynante Orceo, downgrading the suspects' murder charges stating there was no evidence of premeditation and the witnesses failed to substantiate through their testimonies that there was a plan to kill the victims.
Trillanes then identified a certain Supt. Edilberto Leonardo of the Philippine National Police Academy (PNPA) Batch ‘96 as the point person of the Duterte administration’s alleged extrajudicial killing operation.
“Base sa nakalap naming impormasyon, merong isang klase sa PNPA na nagpapasimuno sa mga aktibidad na ito,” Trillanes said.
[Translation: Based on the what we’ve gathered, someone from a PNPA class initiates this activity.]
The senator added Leonardo and Marcos belong to the same team tagged as Duterte’s alleged “death squad” that works with some policemen in active service.
“Meron silang graduation kung magkaroon ng bounty...magkaroon ng reward. ‘Yung isa na-identify namin...yun ang point person nila,” Trillanes said.
[Translation: They have a graduation where they get a reward for every bounty. The one we identified was their point person.]
Meanwhile, a Senate resolution is now being circulated for the signature of senators that have expressed dismay over the DOJ's decision.
Lacson said should there be a need to reopen the probe, the Senate Justice Committee should handle it.
"Question is, how can I reopen when my committee report on the Espinosa killing has already been sponsored and in fact unanimously approved in plenary?" Lacson said.
The Senate committee had earlier submitted its report on November 11, 2016, where they ruled the November 5 killing "premeditated."
"The Senate rule on the matter mentions of oversight as a justification to conduct a hearing but the same rule says that the Senate committee that has the competence is mandated to conduct such hearing. Having said that, since the issue at hand is the prosecutor's move to downgrade to homicide the murder case involving Supt. Marcos et al, I believe that the Justice committee has that competence," Lacson said.
Source :CNN
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