Ombudsman prober takes stand in 1st Jinggoy bail hearing

MANILA, Philippines - Government prosecutors on Tuesday called on the witness stand one of the members of the special team of field investigators created by the Office of the Ombudsman to look into the projects funded by the pork barrel of Senator Jinggoy Estrada.

Field investigator lawyer Vic Escalante Jr. was presented by the prosecution team as the Sandiganbayan 5th Division started the hearing on Estrada's petition to post bail.

Escalante, 32, told the Court that the he was assigned to probe the alleged beneficiaries of the projects sourced from the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) of Estrada from 2007 to 2009.

Bringing along voluminous documents, Escalante was about to testify on the circumstances of his investigation on Estrada's PDAF when the senator's lawyers objected to the witness' presentation.

Estrada's lawyers said Escalante's testimony will be irrelevant and based on hearsay since the field investigator's testimony would be about his interviews on individuals regarding the pork barrel scam.

The lawyers argued that the bail hearing should be summary in nature and the court's time should not be wasted by Escalante's testimony.

Cutting short Escalante's testimony, the Court ordered both the prosecution and the defense panel to sit down and pre-mark all the documents which would be presented during the next bail hearing on Tuesday.

Escalante brought before the court at least 1,000 documents from the Commission on Audit, including Special Allotment Release Orders for the PDAF projects.

Before adjourning the bail hearing, the Court directed the prosecution panel to furnish Estrada's lawyers the list of witnesses and documents to be presented during the proceedings.