De Lima, et al arraignment deferred; DOJ amends raps
The court has postponed the arraignment in a drug case of detained Senator Leila de Lima and three other accused after the Department of Justice (DOJ) sought to amend the charges it filed last February from illegal drug trading to conspiracy to commit illegal drug trading at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) in Muntinlupa City.
De Lima, former Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) Director Franklin JB. Bucayu, her driver Ronnie Dayan, and Joenel Sanchez were scheduled to be arraigned yesterday, but Judge Patria Manalastas de Leon of the Muntinlupa Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 206 postponed it because the DOJ filed a motion to admit amended information.
The four together with Wilfredo Elli, prisoner Jaybee Nino Sebastian and Jose Adrian Dera are accused of illegal drug trading under Republic Act 9165 or the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.
De Leon earlier issued a non-bailable warrant of arrest against the accused. De Lima and Dayan are already in detention, while Bucayu and Sanchez surrendered to authorities. Bucayu is detained at Camp Crame while Sanchez is under the custody of the Muntinlupa City Police. Elli and Dera are at large, according to the court.
Meanwhile, the DOJ assured the legal rights of De Lima were not trampled on as it sought amendments on the rap sheets of the drug charges against her.
“It will not in any way prejudice the rights of the accused,” said Senior Assistant State Prosecutor Ramoncito Ocampo. “Neither will it alter the theory of the prosecution which stands in the original information.”
Ocampo assured “the evidence that the prosecution will suppose to offer under the original information will also be the same set of evidence that will be offered in the amended information.”
He explained there is a need to amend the information of the charges against her “all to be more precise and to conform to the evidence in the allegation in the complaint.”
In the amended information, the DOJ charged that between March, 2013 and May, 2015 when De Lima was still the justice secretary and Bucayu as BuCor chief, they and the other accused “conspiring and confederating together and helping one another, did then and there willfully and unlawfully decided and agree to commit illegal drug trading, in the following manner: by using the inmates of the New Bilibid Prison, to sell and trade dangerous drugs by means of mobile phones and other electronic devices without being authorized by law, and receiving the proceeds thereof totaling to approximately” R70 million.
The DOJ charged that after which they conducted a raid at the NBP maximum security compound but excluded Sebastian to allow “him to centralize, control and monopolize the drug trade inside the New Bilibid Prison.”
Senior Assistant City Prosecutor Ra- moncito Ocampo Jr. explained that they filed the amended information to be more “precise” in the charges against the accused.
But Boni Tacardon, lawyer of Senator De Lima, said the sought amendment by the DOJ will result in two different cases and they will oppose the motion.
However, De Lima’s lawyers opposed the amendments since it would change the allegations against her.
Boni Tacardon, lawyer of the senator, said the sought amendment by the DOJ will result in two different cases and they will oppose the motion.