MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Justice (DOJ) is set to take action to prevent the flight of former commissioner Nicanor Faeldon and other former officials of the Bureau of Customs (BOC) implicated in the alleged smuggling of P6.4 billion worth of shabu in a shipment seized last May.
Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II said he will issue a lookout bulletin order (LBO) to make sure Faeldon and the other respondents do not evade criminal proceedings.
This developed as the respondents in the complaint filed by Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) vowed to face criminal proceedings and not to go into hiding.
“Since the preliminary investigation is already ongoing, we will issue the LBO if the cases would be filed in court,” the DOJ chief said yesterday.
An LBO will not automatically prevent the subjects from leaving the country unlike a hold departure order (HDO) issued by trial courts, but it will require them to ask permission first from the DOJ before they could be allowed to leave.
Aguirre said he would wait for the conclusion of the preliminary investigation (PI) by the investigating panel of prosecutors, believing the respondents presently have no reason to go into hiding.
“Since they are participating in the PI, we can take that as a guarantee that they will not evade the criminal proceedings. If they say they are confident that they will be absolved, then there’s no need to hide,” he stressed.
Should the DOJ find probable cause in the string of charges filed against the former BOC officials and file the case in court, Aguirre said prosecutors could then ask for issuance of the HDO.
Aguirre issued the statement after one of the respondents, former Customs Investigation and Intelligence Service (CIIS) chief Neil Anthony Estrella, publicly said in a recent forum that they would not allow themselves to be jailed over the baseless charges and would rather go into hiding.
The other respondents in the charge sheet are former import assessment services director Milo Maestrecampo; intelligence officers Joel Pinawin and Oliver Valiente; Manila International Container Port district collector lawyer Vincent Phillip Maronilla; Faeldon’s fiancé, lawyer Jeline Maree Magsuci; and BOC employees Alexandra Ventura, Randolph Cabansag, Dennis Maniego, Dennis Cabildo and John Edillor.
They are expected to answer the charges at the next hearing set for Oct. 19.
In a 23-page complaint filed last Sept.18, the PDEA sought the indictment of Faeldon, Estrella and 10 other Customs officers for conspiracy to import illegal drugs and protecting or coddling of drug traffickers under Republic Act 9165 (Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act).
The PDEA also accused Faeldon and other BOC officers of obstruction of justice under Presidential Decree No. 1829 by “harboring or concealing, or facilitating the escape” of the persons behind the shabu shipment.
Faeldon and other respondents were also accused of negligence and tolerance under Article 208 of the Revised Penal Code.
Lastly, the PDEA also filed charges of corrupt practices of public officers under Section 3 of RA 3019 (Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act) for allegedly “causing any undue injury to any party, including the government, or giving any private party any unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference in the discharge of his official administrative or judicial functions through manifest partiality, evident bad faith or gross inexcusable negligence.”
Senate recommendation
The Senate Blue Ribbon committee had also recommended the filing of criminal and administrative charges against former BOC officials in connection with rampant corruption and smuggling activities in the bureau.
In the 52-page draft committee report being circulated among senators for signature, the panel recommended the filing of charges for violation of the Customs Modernization and Tariff Act (CMTA), and the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act against former BOC chief Faeldon, Maestrecampo, Estrella, Pinawin and Gerardo Gambala.
The panel, chaired by Sen. Richard Gordon, held nine hearings into the reported corruption in the BOC and the smuggling of more than a ton of methamphetamine hydrochloride from China that slipped through the bureau’s express or “green lane” in the past several months.
“What happened here is so grave and shocking to the senses because the BOC has failed to guard our portals from the entry of drugs that kill us and our countrymen. Our sentinels have failed us,” the report read.
“We have entered into a new phase in our struggle – huge amounts of drugs are entering the country through the BOC, corrupting public officers, enriching only the players in it, while contributing to the country’s moral decay,” it stated. – With Paolo Romero, Sheila Crisostomo