De Lima wants Sandigan to explain Garcia plea deal

MANILA, Philippines - Justice Secretary Leila de Lima wants the Sandiganbayan to explain the plea-bargaining agreement between the government and former military comptroller Carlos Garcia.

“There are some questions that need to be answered by the Sandiganbayan itself,” she said.

Speaking to reporters, De Lima questioned the anti-graft court’s pronouncement that it has not yet approved the plea bargaining agreement.

“If there has been no approval yet – if their May 4, 2010 order did not yet finally approve the plea-bargaining agreement – how come General Garcia was allowed to post bail already for the lesser offense of direct bribery?” she asked.

“And how come there’s ongoing turnover of assets already?”

De Lima said she is very angry about this development.

“I don’t think they have answered that clearly,” she said.

De Lima said Malacañang is considering investigating Special Prosecutor Wendell Barreras-Sulit and her prosecutors who entered into the plea-bargaining agreement with Garcia.

“(We will do) whatever it takes to put them to task,” she said. “But first things first, investigation should be done.”

De Lima said Barreras-Sulit and the panel of prosecutors should be held accountable for administrative or criminal offenses for entering into the plea bargaining agreement.

She would assign a team of state prosecutors to assist the Office of the President in investigating Barreras-Sulit and her panel of prosecutors, she added.

De Lima questioned the pronouncement of the prosecution panel led by Assistant Special Prosecutor Joseph Capistrano that they agreed to the deal because they don’t have evidence to prove Garcia’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt due to lack of witness.

“Is that the only way to prove plunder?” she asked.

“I’m sure there are other means and ways of proving plunder. I was examining the law (RA 7080), and the last mode of committing plunder is by taking undue advantage of official position or authority to unjustly enrich himself at the expense and to the damage of the Filipino people and the Republic of the Philippines.

“It’s not an excuse for the Office of the Special Prosecutor to say this is their best option.”

De Lima reiterated the Office of the Solicitor General’s stand that the plea-bargaining deal did not have the required consent of the offended party, which is the military.

“It is also required under the rule on plea-bargaining agreement that lesser offense should be covered by the original charge,” she said.

“As argued by Assistant Solicitor General (Amparo) Tang, there was no allegation of

direct bribery in the plunder charge filed against Gen. Garcia.”

De Lima said the government should also determine the loss of P128 million of the more than P300 million allegedly plundered by Garcia.

“The special prosecutors were saying that in fact P128 million was already withdrawn even before the case was filed,” she said.

“We should look into that and find out what happened and who were supposed to be

responsible for that.”

OSP: Clarita’s statement hearsay

The statement of the wife of Garcia to US authorities that her husband received millions of pesos in bribes cannot be used in court, according to the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP).

Deputy Special Prosecutor Jesus Micael said the letter of Clarita Garcia to US immigration officials is hearsay evidence.

“The fact that the confession has some truth to it, as long as it was done without the assistance of counsel, renders the same inadmissible as evidence,” he said.

Based on jurisprudence, a confession should be made with the assistance of a competent and independent lawyer, he added.

Micael said the Sandiganbayan has ruled that Clarita’s statements were admitted when Garcia was denied bail because she was neither an accused nor a respondent at that time.

“Granting for the sake of argument that Clarita Garcia’s extrajudicial statements are admissible, these however, have no probative value,” he said.

“A letter may be offered in evidence and admitted as such but its evidentiary weight depends upon the observance on the rules of evidence.”

Micael said the letter writer must be presented as witness “to provide the other party the opportunity to question him or her on the contents.”

“Being mere hearsay evidence, failure to present the author of the letter renders its contents suspect,” he said.

“Hearsay evidence, whether objected to or not, has no probative value,” he said.

Micael said the prosecution’s failure to present Clarita renders her admissions as hearsay.

A US immigration official presented before the Sandiganbayan did not have personal knowledge on the contents of the extrajudicial statements of Clarita, he added.

Micael said former ombudsman Simeon Marcelo and former special prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio are arguing in favor of Garcia in trying to stop the plea bargaining agreement.

“They want to scuttle the agreement to acquit him, and he gets back all his property,” he said.