Damning testimony comes after Bong Revilla’s release

Ex-senator Bong Revilla was allowed to post bail last Friday from non-bailable malversation raps.

“May trumabaho,” the ombudsman sneered Saturday.

On Tuesday a star witness testified to delivering P250-million malversed money to Revilla.

Revilla skipped the hearing, having paid P1-million bail.

Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla’s remark insinuated ruses. Revilla’s counsel Ramon Esguerra manifested concern that it cast doubt on the integrity of the Sandiganbayan Third Division.

But Justices Ronald Moreno and Fritz delos Santos didn’t take offense. Moreno said that in his two decades as magistrate, “I have never been accused of being influenced, never been bribed and never inhibited.”

A Facebook reel on the controversial bail went viral. Political vlogger Chris Tan researched Moreno’s past rulings.

President Rody Duterte appointed Moreno to the anti-graft court in June 2018, Tan recounted. Three years later, Moreno was among four justices who cleared Makati ex-mayor Elenita Binay of malversation in overpriced hospital equipment.

In 2025, Moreno also penned the clearing of Makati ex-mayors Jojo and Junjun Binay of malversation, Tan added. It concerned what senators had scrutinized for overpriced parking building construction.

Tuesday’s star witness was DPWH ex-Usec. Roberto Bernardo. He swore to have brought P125-million cash to Revilla’s White House residence in 2024. Plus another P125 million in March 2025.

Driver-aide Vergel Niño Garcia also delivered P250 million in February 2025, Bernardo added.

The first delivery consisted of cash in six boxes and one paper bag. The second, 13 boxes. The third, six boxes.

The money was supposed to be for Revilla’s 2025 reelection campaign. He ran but lost under President Bongbong Marcos’ Alyansa para sa Bagong Pilipinas.

Malversation has four elements:

• offender is a public officer;

• he has custody or control of funds or property by reason of the duties of his office;

• government owns the funds or property involved for which he is accountable and

• he appropriated, took or misappropriated, or consented to, or through abandonment or negligence, permitted the taking by another person of such funds or property.

Malversation, like plunder, is non-bailable. Still, an accused can plead for bail as a matter of right. Justices hold bail hearings separate from the case proper.

Revilla’s bail petition was granted Friday morning. Custodians then brought him back to Quezon City Jail in Payatas, near Sandiganbayan. Lawyers worked on papers for the P1 million. Before dusk, Revilla was set free.

Revilla’s co-accused are DPWH Bulacan ex-district engineer Brice Hernandez, engineers Jaypee de Leon Mendoza, Arjay Salvador Domasig, Emelita Juat, accountant Juanito Mendoza and cashier Christina Mae Pineda.

The six have not been accorded bail.

On Tuesday Bernardo incriminated his ex-boss DPWH secretary Manuel Bonoan.

Bernardo detailed their modus operandi:

• Revilla approached him and asked for 25 percent “commitment fee.”

• Bonoan had access to DPWH allocations and discretion to set aside lump-sums for lawmakers who requested projects from him.

• Bonoan got 75 percent, and shared 25 percent each with Bernardo and fellow-Usec. Catalina Cabral (now deceased).

• Although denying participation in the ghost project in Pandi, Bulacan, Bernardo admitted to profiting from other lawmakers.

• Bernardo swore in his affidavit to have serviced Senators Jinggoy Estrada, Francis Escudero and former senator and Makati Mayor Nancy Binay.

Justices Moreno and Delos Santos concurred with Third Division chairman Justice Karl Miranda in denying bail to Revilla’s six co-accused.

Miranda dissented from Revilla’s bail grant, but was overruled by Moreno and Delos Santos, the decision author.

Justice Miranda asserted: “The prosecution was able to present strong evidence against Revilla to warrant the denial of his bail application… Alleged acts of Revilla may only be appreciated properly when contextualized in the kalakaran or scheme perpetrated in DPWH.

“There is strong evidence that Revilla committed the acts alleged in the Information, in furtherance of a conspiracy and this warrants the denial of his bail.

“It is not required to prove that Revilla personally intervened in congressional deliberations to ensure the funding of the project. It is sufficient to show that he committed overt acts, in the absence of which the project would not have been included in the General Appropriations Act.”

Revilla was among lawmakers implicated in 2013 in Janet Lim Napoles’ pork barrel scam. Despite acquittal in 2018, the Sandiganbayan ordered him to return P124.5 million. He refused because already declared innocent.

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