Baba case: Mistaken identity?

Who's afraid of Lorna Rivera Baba?

The diminutive 50-year-old church worker, who is accused of masterminding the murder of rebel priest Fr. Conrado Balweg, is yet another case of mistaken identity, said human rights lawyer Romeo Capulong yesterday.

The Intelligence Services of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (ISAFP) claims Baba is the same Miel Laurenaria wanted for a kidnapping case now pending before Branch 57 of the Regional Trial Court in Lucena City.

"They are not one and the same person," Capulong said before Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 216 Judge Marciano Bacalla, who is hearing a petition for the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus filed on her behalf.

He said this is not the first time the military has used a fake warrant of arrest, citing the case of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan activist Vicente Ladlad, who was arrested by the ISAFP on trumped-up charges. Ladlad was later freed by the military after the court granted his habeas corpus petition.

Bacalla gave both parties five days to prepare their respective positions on the case. He also asked the ISAFP to submit to the court a copy of the arrest warrant Capulong claims to have been forged.

The church worker, a development programs researcher for the Aglipayan Church, was nabbed by ISAFP agents last March 17 in front of the Pidigan parish in Abra shortly after she emerged from a meeting.

Church officials said she was in the company of Aglipayan priests Noel Dacuycuy and Emily Gasco-Dacuycuy and her brother Julius Cesar Gasco II when 10 armed intelligence agents led by a certain Sgt. Rey Boado took her at gunpoint. -