Bid for ex-Czech envoy to testify through video junked

The Office of the Ombudsman stands to lose two of its vital witnesses in the graft cases it filed against former Metro Rail Transit (MRT) Line 3 general manager Al Vitangcol III.

In an eight-page resolution promulgated on April 24 and released to the media yesterday, the Sandiganbayan Sixth Division denied the motion of the ombudsman’s prosecution team to allow former Czech ambassador Josef Rychtar and Inekon Group board chairman and chief executive officer Josef Husek to testify through video conferencing.

“Here, the prosecution failed to convince this Court that such means of presentation of testimonial evidence is necessary,” the ruling penned by division chairman Associate Justice Sarah Jane Fernandez read.

It added that the prosecution failed to substantiate its bare allegations that Rychtar cannot come to the Philippines and attend to the hearings due to his responsibilities as incumbent Czech ambassador to Chile and that Husek’s “health condition and business responsibilities in his home country” also render him incapable of testifying in the Philippines.

Both are supposed to talk on the alleged attempt to extort $30 million from the Czech company Inekon Group in 2012 for an MRT-3 project.

The Sixth Division pointed out that while the Supreme Court, in a 2002 memorandum, said that the presentation of electronic evidence, such as a video testimony, can be allowed in both civil and criminal cases, it must first be established that the presentation of such evidence is necessary.

“It appears that the respective testimonies of Mr. Husek and Amb. Rychtar are vital to the prosecution of the present cases. However, the prosecution failed to show that Mr. Husek and Amb. Rychtar cannot come to the Philippines for the purpose of testifying in the present cases,” the Sixth Division stressed.

Vitangcol and his co-accused Wilson de Vera, one of the directors of maintenance provider PH Trams, are facing two counts each of violation of Republic Act 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, which stemmed from their alleged attempt to extort $30 million from the Inekon Group.