Kuratong suspect files TRO

Police officials and others charged in the 1995 Kuratong Baleleng case appear bent on stopping the Department of Justice (DOJ) from reopening the alleged mass murder of robbery suspects, as a restraining order petition was filed anew with the Manila courts.

Superintendent Almario Hilario and Chief Inspector Ricardo Dandan, both former subordinates and co-accused of Senator-elect and former Philippine National Police (PNP) director general Panfilo Lacson in the case, filed yesterday another restraining order and injunction petition against the DOJ. Judge Herminia Pasamba of the Manila Regional Trial Court Branch 40 dismissed a similar petition filed by Lacson himself just a day before.

Raising the principles of double jeopardy and violation of the rules of court, Hilario and Dandan said the subpoena sent to them to appear for the preliminary investigation, was "illegal and void." The petition described the subpoena as "a bolt of lightning out of a blue sky."

The petitioners are anchoring their arguments on the March 29, 1999 order of Judge Wenceslao Agnir, then of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court, dismissing the case after finding "no probable cause for issuance of warrants of arrest against the accused or to hold them for trial." Agnir has since been promoted to the Court of Appeals.

The petitioners insist that Judge Agnir’s dismissal of the case in 1999 is a "dismissal on the merits and may no longer be revived under the constitutional prohibition of double jeopardy… their non-arraignment notwithstanding." – Jose Aravilla