Dumlao seeks to be dropped from suspect list

MANILA, Philippines - Former police superintendent Glenn Dumlao asked the Manila regional trial court (RTC) yesterday to recall the warrant of arrest against him and exclude him as an accused in the November 2000 twin murders of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and driver Emmanuel Corbito.

In a seven-page motion for reconsideration, Dumlao’s lawyer, Rogelio Agoot, asked Manila RTC Branch 18 Judge Myra Garcia Fernandez to set aside the amended charges filed in 2005 that included Dumlao in the list of respondents.

Agoot said the Supreme Court excluded Dumlao from the list of suspects, as shown in the prosecution panel’s Sept. 14, 2001 amended charges, which also indicated that Dumlao was supposed to be the prosecution’s “number four witness.”

He said the prosecution erroneously re-included Dumlao in the list of suspects in 2005.

Dumlao, wearing a bullet-proof vest and accompanied by heavily armed National Bureau of Investigation agents, arrived in court yesterday for his scheduled arraignment at 2 p.m. 

His arraignment, however, was reset to Aug. 26, since the court will still decide on Agoot’s motion.

Mancao downed by amoebiasis

Former senior superintendent Cezar Mancao II, a state witness and formerly one of the accused, failed to appear in court yesterday.

His lawyer, Ferdinand Topacio, brought a medical certificate indicating his client was suffering from amoebiasis. “But we assure you, he is not backing out of his statements. This is just a minor inconvenience,” he said.

Mancao was also ordered to appear in court on August 26.

If this would push through, both Mancao and Dumlao would see each other for the first time since they were extradited back to the Philippines this year.

Mancao is being kept at a Witness Protection Program (WPP) safehouse of the Department of the Justice, while Dumlao is detained at the NBI headquarters on Taft Avenue, Manila.