Ecleo Case: Witness says cops dictated affidavit

One of the prosecution witnesses in the murder of lawyer Arbet Sta. Ana-Yongco disowned part of her affidavit saying it was the police who supplied the data for her.

Eugena Teofilo, 32, said she did not tell police that the person that Yongco's killer was 5'7" tall but the other way around. Teofilo said that she only told the police that the man she saw at the vicinity of Yongco's house a few minutes before she was killed was taller than she was.

Teofilo said it was the police who concluded that the suspect is 5'7" tall when she told them that she stands 4'11" and the person she saw was taller.

"Ingon man ang polis nga sige five-seven nalang na," Teofilo said. Nevertheless, she admitting signing the affidavit even if the estimate of the height was not hers.

Teofilo testified that she saw Michel Favila Sr. near Yongco's house last October 11 with another accused Nestor Carrol who waiting on a motorcycle.

Teofilo said that she was on her way to the nearby Victory Chaper to pray when the heavily bearded man, holding a red Nokia cellphone under the Acacia tree, caught her attention.

"Nagtinutukay ming duha, kanang iyang mata, isog kaayo ba," Teofilo said on direct examination.

Defense lawyer Orlando Salatandre flared up yesterday upon cross-examining the witness after the later complained of his loud voice. Salatandre said he wanted to point out the inconsistency in the actual height of Favila as compared to that of the affidavit of the witnesses.

Favila is tagged as the assailant of Yongco, formerly lead prosecutor in the parricide case against Ruben Ecleo Jr., supreme master of the Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association where Favila is a member.