Court junks plea to free suspected NPA

The petition to release from detention Ricardo Belamia, the labor leader arrested on suspicion that he was once a front leader of the New People’s Army, has been denied.

Regional Trial Court-Cebu City Judge Geraldine Faith Econg, in her order, said that the basis of Belamia’s wife, Editha, in filing a petition for habeas corpus was wrong.

Econg dismissed the claims of Mrs. Belamia, saying that there were an amended information, an alias warrant of arrest, and an order of commitment against a certain “Ricardo Bellamia/Ricardo Bilamia,” and not just “Ka Yuri.” 

After yesterday’s hearing of the petition, Econg further said she has been convinced that RTC-branch 25 in Danao City has issued a commitment order for Ricardo Bellamia/Ricardo Bilamia when the arresting officers turned Belamia over to the court after his arrest last November 2.

Econg said that Editha also failed to prove that there were exceptional circumstances to justify the release of her husband.

Editha, in her petition, claimed that the alias warrant of arrest “bears only the name ‘Ka Yuri’ with a typewritten name ‘Ricardo Belamia’ above the name ‘Ka Yuri,’” the judge said adding that Mr. Belamia was “inconsistent in his declaration of the description of the alias warrant of arrest that was shown to him.”

Econg said that a question raised over an error in the issued warrant would not make such warrant void because Belamia” is not left without any remedy to challenge the warrant of arrest in the rebellion case by moving that the warrant be quashed.”

The petition that Editha filed “cannot substitute for such remedy,” Econg said. In her petition, Editha alleged that authorities arrested her husband even if his name was not in the original copy of the alias warrant of arrest issued by the RTC-Danao City.

Belamia’s name that appeared in the warrant, which was presented by the arresting officers, was only typewritten on top of the alias name “Ka Yuri,” argued Editha. 

When the arresting officers brought Belamia to RTC in Danao on November 5 for a commitment order, the court refused to issue the order because there was no amended information changing the name “Ka Yuri” to that of Belamia’s, contended Editha.

Senior Supt. Augusto Marquez Jr., head of the Regional Intelligence Division of the Police Regional Office-7, took the witness stand yesterday and declared there was nothing illegal about the arrest and detention of Belamia.

Soldiers of the Central Command and policemen arrested Belamia at dawn last November 2 for his alleged involvement in the mid-north rebel attacks of military outposts in 2004 and 2005 and for allegations that he was a former front leader of the NPA.

Marquez earlier alleged that Belamia was secretary of the Regional White Area Committee, a legal front of the armed wing of the NPA, deputy secretary of the NPA’s Cebu Island Command and the Front Committee 2 in Cebu, and secretary of the Kumiting Rehiyon sa Sentral Bisayas.

Marquez further claimed Belamia was involved in at least five rebels’ clashes against the 78th Infantry Battalion in the mid-north area from 2002 and 2006 that resulted in the death of soldiers.

These clashes were against soldiers on October 11, 2002 in Danao City; the attack of the 78th IB outpost in Carmen on December 12, 2002 that killed seven soldiers; and encounter against 78th IB men on September 17, 2003 in Tuburan.

He was also linked to the rebels’ attack of the army outpost in October 2005 at Tuburan, killing five of the soldiers; encounter in Tuburan last year, killing NPA leader Gerry Badayos; and the rebels’ fund-raising activity for their armed wing members in the mountains.

Belamia has since denied these accusations, insisting that authorities were only making up stories. He only admitted being an organizer of the labor union in a glass company in barangay Guadalupe in 1985 then joined and organized other labor unions since then. –Joeberth M. Ocao/RAE