NBI defends murder raps vs NCRPO on NBP

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) justified the filing of a murder complaint against 22 policemen for the deaths of eight high-profile inmates at the New Bilibid Prison, saying the officers took advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic to kill them.

In a 73-page complaint filed before the Department of Justice last July 1, the NBI found enough circumstantial evidence to prove that the cops – all members of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO)– killed the inmates, who died after they were separated from other inmates who were up for isolation at Site Harry.

For the NBI probers, the fact that the convicts were last seen alive with the police personnel should be enough evidence to identify the suspects in the killing.

Bilibid convicts Francis Go, Shuli Lim Zhang, Jimmy Ang, Eugene Chua, Benjamin Marcelo, Sherwin Sanchez, Amin Boratong and Willy Yang died allegedly due to COVID-19 during the period May 28 to June 17, 2020.

But the NBI found their deaths suspicious because these happened just days apart and after they were separated from other inmates at the Site Harry isolation building.

While the police said they died of COVID-19, the inmates who last saw the victims alive described them as healthy before the transfer to another area.

Adding to the suspicion of murder was the inspection of Site Harry, where the NBI found no air-conditioned room the suspects were supposedly confined and taken care of.

The NBI provided the timeline of their deaths after the “approximate date” of their transfer on May 23 to another isolation room – Go died on May 28, Zhang died May 30 while Ang died June 1.

Meanwhile, the others died on the day of their transfer – Chua and Marcelo on June 2, Sanchez on June 4, and Yang on June 17. Boratong died on June 5, a day after his transfer.

The NBI also reviewed closed circuit television (CCTV) footage, which showed that body bags, presumed to be carrying the cadavers of Zhang, Ang and Yang, were brought from Site Harry to the New Bilibid Prison hospital.

The CCTV footage did not show the delivery of Boratong to the hospital as claimed by the police. Footage showed a body bag exiting Site Harry on the day of Boratong’s death.

Murder can be proven even with the absence of the inmates’ bodies, which were cremated due to existing COVID-19 protocols at the time, the NBI said.

The NBI cited Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code, which considered “epidemics” as among the attendant circumstances in committing murder.

The Supreme Court had ruled the existence of this qualifying circumstance as a “debased form of criminality met in one who, in the midst of a great calamity, instead of lending aid to the afflicted, adds to their suffering by taking advantage of their misfortune to despoil them,” a part of the complaint sheet reads.

“Killing a person on the occasion of inundation, shipwreck, eruption of a volcano, epidemic, etc. or any other public calamity, when taken advantage of by the offender, qualifies the crime to murder,” it added.

“It is unquestionable that (the police) took advantage of the fact that victims were confined at Building 4, Site Harry, an NCRPO-managed isolation area, due to the alleged COVID-19 infection,” it further alleged.

The NBI said respondents resorted to cremation as the “final act to consummate and effectively cover-up the scheme to kill herein victims.”

Because of the absence of the bodies due to cremation, the NBI cited the cases on “peculiar nature of extrajudicial killing” where the Supreme Court ruled that “presumptive” and “circumstantial” evidence should be enough to prove murder.

“A conviction of murder cannot be supported unless the body has been found or there is equivalent proof of death. The more modern rule is that the fact of death as well as the other branch of the corpus delicti may be established by circumstantial or presumptive evidence,” the NBI said.

“Thus (it) is held that, where the body has been destroyed or is not recovered, it is competent to establish both elements by presumptive evidence,” it added.

The following NCRPO personnel, including a doctor, were included as respondents in the murder complaint: Maj. Lymel Pasquin; S/Sg. Rannel Gadiano and Christian Mercarsos; Corporals Laurence Antiporta, Jhunben Alegado, Jayson Añonuevo, Rosanie Bernales, Michael Boco, Rolex Borgonia, Jophy Bu-ot, Gilwen Garcia, Edmar Gerra, Archie Grapa, Vernardo Into, Ener Restauro, Banedy Solante, Jernie Tiongzon and Jan Uy; Patrolmen Roland Duran, James Aninapon, and Rey Fernandez, and Dr. Beverly de Guzman.

Pasquin is the leader of the NCRPO team, while Uy and Borgonia are the duty nurses under the watch of De Guzman.