Ex-mayor gets 66 years for usurpation of authority

For officiating weddings and issuing a business permit while he was suspended, a former mayor of Norzagaray, Bulacan may spend up to 66 years in prison.

In a 32-page decision dated May 11 and released on Friday, the Sandiganbayan’s Seventh Division found Feliciano Legaspi Sr. guilty of 38 counts of usurpation of official functions under Article 177 of the Revised Penal Code.

“Evidence had sufficiently shown that accused unlawfully solemnized 37 marriages and issued a mayor’s permit under the pretense that he could validly do so as the municipal mayor... which were accomplished during the period he had been suspended... by the Office by the Ombudsman,” the antigraft court ruling penned by Associate Justice Ma. Theresa Dolores Gomez-Estoesta read.

The Sandiganbayan said evidence and witnesses presented by state prosecutors proved that Legazpi solemnized 37 marriages from Dec. 14, 2012 to May 10, 2013 and issued a business permit to Wacuman Inc. on Feb. 22, 2013.

Legazpi was suspended from December 2012 to June 2013 after he was found guilty of grave abuse of authority in connection with another administrative case.

“Despite accused’s general defense of denial, which pertained more to his recollection, he did not endeavor to show that the signatures appearing on each of the marriage certificates and mayor ’s permit are not his,” the court said.

The Sandiganbayan gave weight to the testimony of personnel of the Norzagaray municipal civil registry that they saw Legaspi signing the marriage certificates.

Records custodians at the Philippine Statistics Authority vouched for the authenticity of the marriage certificates and mayor’s permit.

The court also cited the testimony of the acting mayor at the time, Rogelio Santos Jr., “who was caught in the midst of the chaos of performing the functions of the mayor who did not want to step down to serve the penalty of suspension.”