4 sentenced to life imprisonment for possession of shabu

A Manila drug court yesterday sentenced three women and a man to suffer the penalty of life imprisonment after they were reportedly caught in possession of a total of 532.526 grams of shabu in a police checkpoint two years ago in Quiapo.

Judge Carmelita Manahan, of Branch 16 of the Manila City Regional Trial Court, found the three women Pakungan Talib, Asna Gugo, and Aga Ulong and the male accused Danny Ulong guilty of possessing several grams of shabu.

Talib was found in possession of 46.685 grams, Gugo with 49.185 grams, Ulong with 49.595 grams, while Danny had eight heat sealed sachet of shabu containing a total of 389.061 grams. The women, all residents of Masbate, each had one sachet. All bore the measurement of 3 by 2 - inches of plastic sachet. All the women were ordered by the court to each suffer the sentence of life imprisonment and pay P400,000 penalty. Danny was also ordered to suffer the same jail term except that his penalty was higher than the other accused, with P500,000.

The four accused reportedly violated Section 11 of Republic Act 9165, otherwise known as the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002. The women received a lighter penalty because the drugs they possessed were more than 10 grams but less than 50 grams.

“All the elements are present in cases at bar. Each of the accused was caught in flagrante delicto in possession of shabu,” said Manahan. In the 13-page decision, it appeared that at 4 a.m. of June 18, 2004, the team of Police Inspector Jose Joy Asayo and his team conducted a routine police checkpoint along the Muelle de Quinta Street in Quiapo.

It was at this juncture when Police Officer 2 Vicente Baquiran spotted a motorized pedicab and flagged it down for inspection. He noticed that Ulong had a plastic bag wrapped and taped on her right ankle. He then asked her to open the plastic bag and saw that it contained a plastic sachet of white crystalline substance.

When the other policemen inspected the other passengers, they discovered that they also carried prohibited substance in heat sealed sachets. It was during the inspection when another motorized pedicab arrived with four persons, consisting of two male and two female. On Danny’s possession, they found him carrying a black clutch bag that contained the eight packs of white crystalline substance.

They arrested all the seven passengers of the two pedicabs and brought them to the Police Community Precinct of Police Station 3 in Quiapo area. But the three others were later released by the inquest fiscal.

Manahan said that the testimonies of the five prosecution witnesses were straightforward, consistent and credible. They arrested the accused at a checkpoint. They have identified the corpus delicti; and they positively identified each of the accused in open court as the persons they arrested.

The defense, on the other hand, claimed that no arrest happened in Quiapo. The apprehensions happened along Rosarito Street in Sampaloc.