Ombudsman gives opinion on Garcia plea bargaining agreement

MANILA, Philippines - Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales is merely stating an opinion on the possible flaws of the plea bargaining agreement between state prosecutors and former military comptroller Carlos Garcia and is not moving to have the deal voided.

“It’s just an expression of the new Ombudsman’s views and stand on the matter,” Morales’ lawyer Christian Uy told the Sandiganbayan Second Division yesterday.

“It is basically just food for thought,” he told Second Division magistrates Teresita Diaz-Baldos, Samuel Martires, and Oscar Herrera.

In the plea bargain deal, Garcia offered to plead guilty to lesser offenses of direct bribery and money laundering instead of plunder and return P130 million of the more than P300 million he allegedly stole. The deal also allowed him to post bail. Morales’ predecessor Merceditas Gutierrez approved the plea bargain agreement. Morales earlier submitted to the Sandiganbayan an 18-page position paper questioning the deal.

“It was to get her thoughts across,” Uy said, referring to the position paper.

“These are her thoughts which she felt the need to at least relay to the court,” he added.

Uy declined to answer when pressed for Morales’ possible motive for her “pleading.”

“Why didn’t you wait for the court to promulgate the sentencing of the accused in this case?” Martires asked Morales’ lawyers.

“Supposing we set aside the plea bargain deal, will it be the OSG (Office of the Solicitor General) who will appear? Because it appears now that the participation of the OSP (Office of the Special Prosecutors) will be done away with?” Diaz-Baldos asked Uy to which he replied, “not necessarily.”

Diaz-Baldos said it seems the Office of the Ombudsman doesn’t want to assume full responsibility which is why it wants co-prosecutors in the OSG instead of “harnessing” the skills of its own lawyers at the OSP.

After hearing the explanation of Uy and another lawyer Maricel Oquiendo, Diaz-Baldos, as chair of the Sandiganbayan Second Division, ruled to have the position paper “noted.”

“Let it be clarified too that the May 9 Resolution is nowhere being sought to be nullified,” she added, referring to the ant-graft court’s decision five months ago approving the Garcia plea bargaining agreement.

Meanwhile, the Second Division junked an indirect contempt charge filed by the Office of the Ombudsman against Simeon Marcelo and Dennis Villa-Ignacio.

The case stemmed from Marcelo’s and Villa Ignacio’s open letter to President Aquino on Dec. 20, 2010 wrongly informing him that Garcia filed a demurer to evidence that was denied by the court.

The Sandiganbayan said it dropped the case citing the public apology issued by the two even if the wrong information had besmirched the reputation of the Office of the Ombudsman and the OSP.

“The court and the individual justices of the former Special Division do not doubt the sincerity of that public apology made several times over, even as they still continue to reel in the quagmire lamentably woven for them by the latter. They continue to bear silently the stigma unjustifiably wrought by irresponsible public opinion generated by the subject letter,” the decision read.

“Thus, in the spirit of magnanimity, they feel reluctant to impose any sanction for the respondent’s contemptuous acts and choose to entrust their redemption to time and future events,” the ruling read.

It credited the Ombudsman lawyers for “promoting the administration of justice through the prosecution of cases within the ambit or sphere of evidence at its disposal. In that respect, damage to its reputation has not impeded or degraded the administration of justice.”

“This court can bear witness to the groundswell of public opinion that practically cursed the court and the justices, and hurled on them all kinds of baseless charges, oiled by inaccurate reports and opinions about the plea bargaining agreement,” the Sandiganbayan justices said.