Prosecutors ask Jimenez to testify in extortion case vs Nani

MANILA, Philippines – State lawyers have asked former Manila congressman Mark Jimenez to testify before the Sandiganbayan on the $2-million extortion case he filed against former justice secretary Hernando Perez.

Jimenez later withdrew the complaint against Perez but government prosecutors decided to pursue it.

Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio said members of the special prosecution panel handling four criminal charges, including extortion, against Perez and three others would try to convince Jimenez to appear before the anti-graft court and simply affirm his testimony against the accused.

“He is a significant witness since he is the main and lone complainant. So we definitely welcome him testifying before the court,” Villa-Ignacio told The STAR.

He said prosecutors would ask the former lawmaker to testify “in the interest of truth and of the public.”

“If he has forgiven Secretary Perez already, we respect that. But this case has become public interest already, so we would ask him to just speak the truth before the court,” he said.

The plan to convince Jimenez to testify against Perez stemmed from the hearing on the extortion case at the anti-graft court’s second division last May 23 when Associate Justice Edilberto Sandoval warned of possible dismissal of the case should the complainant and lone witness fail to appear before the court.

The court division, which earlier called Jimenez, said it is necessary for him to testify since charges being heard are primarily based on his testimony.

Critics earlier said charges filed by the Ombudsman against Perez and three others last April would most likely be dismissed by the Sandiganbayan since Jimenez had already withdrawn his complaint even during preliminary investigation last year.

No withdrawal of testimony

But Villa-Ignacio clarified that while the motion for desistance meant withdrawal of complaint, it did not necessarily mean withdrawal of testimony.

“The motion for desistance was not a denial of what he said in his complaint-affidavit. He did not take back what he said so it still stands,” he argued.

Villa-Ignacio, however, admitted that he did not have the chance to review and polish the information filed by the Office of the Ombudsman before the anti-graft court.

“We would have crafted an information more suitable to the law. It would have been better if we were involved in the preparation of the case since we would be the ones to defend it in court,” he said.

Reacting to critics of the complaints filed by the Ombudsman, the special prosecutor added: “I hope the case would not be dismissed as they feared.”

Ombudsman Ma. Merceditas Gutierrez said the withdrawal of complaint made by Jimenez did not carry weight as it was “executed as an afterthought.”

“The denial of Perez cannot overcome the positive assertion of Jimenez, more so that the charges were substantiated with convincing evidence,” the Ombudsman said in a 66-page resolution last year, which it upheld last April 18.

In his complaint, Jimenez accused Perez of “threatening and intimidating me and my family with bodily harm and incarceration in a city jail with hardened criminals and drug addicts unless I execute damaging affidavits against President Estrada and his cronies and associates.”

Jimenez, who himself was jailed in the US for illegal campaign contribution, revealed that he deposited $2 million in Coutts Bank, Hong Kong, in February 2001.

The Ombudsman said the money trail showed “united, concerted and coordinated acts of unlawfully taking the money of Jimenez, which indicate a working conspiracy” among the accused.

Jimenez reportedly brokered the $470-million power contract with Argentine firm Industrias Metalurgicas Pescarmona Sociedad Anonima or IMPSA for which he received $2 million. But he denied the allegations.

The Sandiganbayan is now handling four separate charges against Perez in relation to the extortion case. The anti-graft court’s first and fourth divisions were assigned the graft charges, the second with robbery/extortion charges while the third with falsification of public documents.

Hearing on the extortion charges is set to resume at the end of the month.       – Edu Punay