SERIOUS ILLEGAL DETENTION CASE AGAINST NAPOLES MIGHT BE DROPPED

No detention: Calida says that Luy had several opportunities to leave, but he did not

Solicitor General Jose Calida yesterday recommended that pork barrel scam suspect Janet Lim Napoles be cleared in the Benhur Luy illegal detention case. Napoles will, however, still stand trial for plunder and graft charges over the alleged misuse of a P10-billion Priority Development Assistance Fund, or pork barrel. “The serious illegal detention case has nothing to do with the graft case,” Calida said.

Solicitor General Jose Calida on Wednesday recommended that pork barrel scam suspect Janet Lim Napoles be cleared in the illegal detention case filed by Benhur Luy.

Napoles will, however, still stand trial for plunder and graft charges over the alleged misuse of a P10-billion Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).

“The serious illegal detention case has nothing to do with the graft case,” Calida said in a press conference aired on television.

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo, in a telephone interview, said he supports the decision of the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG), saying Calida is “competent” to weigh in the illegal detention case filed against Napoles.

“The position of the Chief Presidential Legal Counsel will coincide with what the OSG has stated because they are the agency that looked over the records of the case,” Panelo said.

“Since the OSG is the office that studied the case and it is the office that recommended the acquittal of the accused, we have to abide by its position, unless independent entities can show us that the decision is contrary to the evidence and the records of the case,” he added.

Calida said the facts they have gathered showed that Luy, a second cousin of Napoles and the whistle-blower in the pork barrel scam, was neither physically restrained nor deprived of his liberty during the time that he was allegedly detained in a retreat house from December 2012 to March 2013.

He said Luy had several opportunities to leave the retreat house, but he did not. Luy also allegedly went out of the retreat house several times and was allowed to see his family on three occasions. Video footage of the alleged rescue of Luy also showed that he did not voluntarily go with the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) agents.

Calida said they have submitted a manifestation to the Court of Appeals. He said they made the recommendation to ensure that justice will not send an innocent person to the gallows.