Garcia pleads guilty to lesser offenses

MANILA, Philippines –  Former military comptroller retired Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia pleaded guilty yesterday to direct bribery and to violation of the Anti-Money Laundering Act before the Sandiganbayan Second Division.

The move was part of a plea bargaining agreement that would allow the government to instantly recover over P135.4 million of his alleged ill-gotten wealth.

Originally charged with plunder and violation of the Anti-Money Laundering Act, Garcia faced Sandiganbayan Presiding Justice Edilberto Sandoval and Associate Justices Teresita Diaz-Baldos and Samuel Martires to enter guilty pleas for lesser offenses.

The anti-graft court had him re-arraigned and announced that the plea bargain deal would be submitted for resolution.

Garcia’s lawyer Constantino de Jesus said the court should consider the former general’s voluntary surrender as well as his act of entering guilty pleas in handing down a verdict.

In the plea bargaining agreement, Garcia agreed to surrender properties and cash kept in the country and abroad, including those owned by his wife Clarita and sons Juan Paulo, Ian Carl, and Timothy Mark valued at P135.4 million.

Government lawyers declined to give details of the deal but stressed that it was “consistent with the interest of the state since justice will be served proceeding from an assured and agreed plea to a lesser offense.”

His wife and sons have supposedly executed Special Powers of Attorney with transfer and waivers of rights in the US where they have also pleaded guilty to bulk cash smuggling in exchange for their freedom.

Garcia had been acquitted of three of four counts of perjury. The fourth is on appeal.

Government lawyers explained that the amount of P303 million in the plunder charge against Garcia was inaccurate and that it was only for P135 million that he could be pinned down.

It wasn’t clear yet how the plea bargain deal would affect the forfeiture case being heard by the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division involving the same assets.

A prosecutor who declined to be named said the plea bargain deal “saves the government from unnecessary expenditures, will preserve the assets that are still there to recover, and will prevent the depletion of the properties that the government is going to recover.”

“As far as the prosecution is concerned, he loses everything,” a prosecutor said, referring to Garcia. He said Garcia would likely be the first to be convicted of money laundering by the Sandiganbayan.